Hermione's Little Secret
by LittleRoma
Summary: What if Hermione were really royalty? Would Hermione's school days have changed much? Would she still be friends with Harry and Ron? Read to find out. AU, OOC, OC, changes have been made. Previously Hermione has got a secret. Started Revisions on the 1st December, chapter One up
1. Chapter One

_**Hi Roma here! As you know I decided to edit, it's probably going to be darker, blame the repeats of Criminal Minds I've been addicted too! Anyway, I don't own Harry Potter, the Royal family, the Dark Knight Trilogy, the Lord of the Rings Trilogy or the books 'Of Mice and Men' or 'An Inspector Calls'. Anyway hope you guys enjoy it, I've also decided to put songs at the start**_

_**"This could be the Start of Something Big"  
Steve Allen, 1956**_

_**"This could be the start of something very big  
Why don't you play your part?  
Please give your hand to me and see  
This could be the start of something wonderful  
Why don't you take a chance?"**_

* * *

The date was the 1st November 1981, Alfred was sitting in his living room polishing his shoes, ready for another day of work the following day. If Alfred could only claim to have learnt one thing in working at such a high-level position as Head Butler for the Queen of England for ten years, it was to have shiny shoes. It wouldn't do to show potential guests that he might've accidentally stepped in a bit of mud while taking the dogs for a walk. He had to maintain a public image of being a willing Butler, of always being clean, in fact he had to maintain the image of being rather important. Alfred knew that he was important but still.

While Alfred was polishing his shoes, he thought back on the strange day. He knew he had noticed rather strange characters in strange fashions in what would seem to be a rather jubilant mood throughout the day. The men and indeed women looked like they had taken to wearing their bathrobes out of the house, or had suddenly taken to wearing a rather bizarre dress. Alfred didn't understand the fashion, but then Alfred would willingly admit that he had never watched London Fashion Week, he wasn't entirely clear on some of the get-ups people would wear. Then again, Alfred had seen some particularly bizarre fashions, like big hair, blazers with shoulder pads, he only knew that they tended to look rather daft and nonsensical.

Alfred thought that the people were all looking strangely excited about something, he thought he had heard a few people whispering. It seemed like they were whispering something about a Dark Lord being stopped. In fact Alfred had heard a name being whispered. A name that made Alfred shiver because he thought he recognised it from somewhere. Deciding to write down the name Potter, just in case it became important anything. Alfred ripped up out the piece of notebook paper and tucked it into his pocket.

Sitting down to watch the TV when he heard a strange report being made on the BBC. _"And finally, birdwatchers everywhere have reported that the nation's owls have been behaving very unusually today. Although owls normally hunt at night and are hardly ever seen in daylight, there have been hundreds of sightings of these birds flying in every direction since sunrise. Experts are unable to explain why the owl have suddenly changed their sleeping pattern."_

Taking this to mean that he probably wasn't going crazy, that other people had actually noticed what he thought he was noticing. Continuing to watch the TV, Alfred thought he wanted to wanted to know what the weather was the following day. He heard the weatherman saying _"I don't know about that, but it's not only the owls that have been acting oddly today. Viewers as far apart as Kent, Yorkshire and Dundee have been phoning in to tell me that instead of the rain I promised yesterday, they've had a downpour of shooting stars! Perhaps people have been celebrating Bonfire Night early - it's not until next week, folks! But I can promise a wet night tonight."_

Deciding to turn off the TV, Alfred thought that he had gotten the Queen's conference room later, for some later meeting among some of Britain's leaders.

* * *

At that moment the Queen was dressed in a skirt suit, she was meeting with Prime Minister of England, Margaret Thatcher. Sitting in front of her on the large oaken Conference table was a small folder. On the small folder was stamped -

CONFIDENTIAL

On the front page, the name Lord Voldemort was printed beside the name. Looking underneath, the Queen saw printed:

_A vicious terrorist, that has been operating in England, Wales, Scotland and to a lesser extent Ireland over the last eleven year. Lord Voldemort is willing to use excessive force. Voldemort goes round killing people he see's as beneath him. Among the most killed are muggle-borns and halfbloods. Voldemort also enjoys to target muggles, seeing them as useless and beneath them._

Some of the words didn't make much sense to the Queen, but then she considered that the people she had been forwarded this file from, tended to take a rather condescending view on muggles.

As a young girl, Elizabeth could remember them talking down to her Father when it came to the Second World War. Elizabeth could distinctly remember them mention someone called 'Grimblewort' or some kind of name similar. In fact Elizabeth remembered thinking that right, because regular Britain didn't have enough trouble fighting a war. It had left an impression of the Magical world as being arrogant. Not exactly leaving the best taste in a person's mouth. Ms Thatcher walked into the room, with an aide trailing behind her with two steaming hot cups of coffee. The aide, a nice young woman, placed the cups of coffee on the table in front of the Prime Minister and the Queen, looking harried. Once the door was closed behind the aide, the PM nodded a quick hello and opened the manilla folder to read through for herself.

Elizabeth flicked some more through the folder and began to look down at the patterns on her desk. After a while the Queen said

"So Mrs Thatcher, have you heard anything about what is going on?"

"No, I'm afraid I haven't, but I have noticed the rather excessive partying going on in rather small pockets around the country. We have recorded some strange electromagnetic pulses occurring throughout the country. In all honesty we're not entirely sure of what is going here and we don't like to be in the dark in any kinds of things about the potential safety of the country"

"I can understand that, but I'm sure its all completely logical in some way."

"No, the file. Did you read the file? I don't understand all of it, but I think I can understand some it. From what I can understand, it's something to do with the magical world. If you flick through it, you can see a probable profile, but it's half assed"

"Yes, it would most certainly seem that way, it seems like a child of five has wrote it. For instance we can tell that he was probably a psychopath, maybe gave off some of the early signs."

After the two had been discussing elements of the case for a while, for about half an hour or so, a new woman walked it. With her hair in a sloppy looking bun, with strands coming losing, ironically the woman had blonde hair so it looked like a small hurricane had taken place round her head. Her clothes, which was yet another what looked like a black robe, was slightly out of place. The woman was carrying a rather large patent, shiny, red handbag was staggering it with her glasses askew. Needless to say the woman wasn't exactly impressing either of the leaders already sitting in the room.

"You're late" Thatcher barked out

"Or, am I on time and you are just really early?" the woman tipsily giggled.

The Queen rolled her eyes and cleared her throat. Seeming to sober up at once, the woman began to speak

"My name is Millicent Bagnold, we've met before. I called this meeting to inform you that the threat known as Lord Voldemort has successfully been neutralised. He is to all intents dead but we were unable to recover a body from the site of his downfall."

Exchanging a look the Queen said "Believe me when I say that you need to find this body. If you don't then supporters of his ideologies, and of course conspiracy theorists can claim that because there was no body, then the 'villain' is not truly dead. Of course then you have to be careful of how you bury them, for example if the 'villain' has a proper burial place, it could become a shrine."

Millicent Bagnold lifted her hand up to head, running her hand through her brown hair

"Unfortunately that's not going to be a problem because Lord Voldemort was preaching ideology that has been around for centuries. So even if we managed to prove conclusively that he was six feet under, we would still be having trouble with former followers. There were a lot you know, of followers, a lot of fear."

"Okay, so are there has been a big evil guy that has fallen, I'm assuming that that is the reason for the partying and the rather strange atmosphere that is gripping small individual pockets of the country?" Thatcher asked

"Yes, simply because we have been living underneath a cloud of fear for the past eleven years. Can you imagine eleven years of being frightened? Of being too terrified to trust anyone and then feeling completely guilty because you haven't been able to trust close friends, family? When it was all over, it was like a sudden cloud had been moved from the sky. A massive weight has been lifted from our shoulders. At this time, I assert our inalienable right to party"

The Queen shifted her weight on her seat, thinking. She wasn't entirely impressed but then Elizabeth could well remember the second world war. She had been evacuated to Windsor Palace along with her sister Margaret, but her parents had stayed behind in Buckingham Palace, to reassure Londoners that their Royal family was still supporting them. Elizabeth could well remember sitting beside the old radio in the kitchens, listening to the likes of Richard Dimbleby, Frank Gillard and Wynford Vaughan-Thomas on the BBC, or National Programme for any news of her parents dying. Elizabeth had been so thankful that instead of dying the Palace had only suffered nine direct hits. Elizabeth could remember praying for the end of the war and just hoping that everyone she loved would be safe again. Elizabeth thought that if she could remember some of the fear and desperation that so dominated much of the war. She could well remember the joy in Britain from VE day on the 8th May 1945, the mass street parties.

If ever Elizabeth had ever felt like partying, it had been that day. So saying she could well understand the overwhelming desire to party and celebrate. She supposed that she could forgive Bagnold, but in all honesty Elizabeth thought that if the Wizarding World continued in such a fashion, it could risk the Wizarding World being refound. This alone could be catastrophic, Elizabeth could only imagine some of the scandal. Something that had been hotly denied for years, was suddenly could there, was suddenly real. After all now magical people were treated as something from a fairytale, not real but a nice thing to believe in. For example you had the fairy godmother in Cinderella, the idea of magic in the Brothers Grimm stories.

Suddenly Bagnold sat forward and began drumming her nails of the desk stopping abruptly when the Prime Minister coughed irritably.

"Right sorry, we have trials coming up now, and we will unfortunately hit a lot off confusion. You see there are spells in the magical worlds that can make someone do things, for example commit terrible atrocities even if they don't want too. We will also have to work out if there is some way that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named used to mark his followers. Though unfortunately we have not yet developed any of method."

Mrs Thatcher leaned forward in her seat "In our world, a gang will usually mark their followers with a tattoo or some kind of ritualistic scarring. Though I can see your troubles with the whole identifying the remaining followers. Some massive gangs, for example Eastern gangs spring to mind because the only person who know who all of the followers are, is the leader. To prevent people betraying you see. I most certainly wish you luck with this."

The Queen examined her hands, thinking and wondering if there was someway for her to help, she couldn't think of anything, not of the top of her head anyway.

The end of the meeting had finally arrived, clutching a small folder, the Queen brought it back. When she got back to Buckingham Palace the following day she would store it in a locked filing cabinet, just in case she need it any later. She didn't think that she would need it, but Elizabeth tended to treat files like you would with clothes - knowing that if she threw out a file with pertinent information, it would be the one file that she would need later on in life.

* * *

Sitting in a Palace nine years later was a little girl sitting on her bed. She was wearing a blue pair of jeans and a white button down blouse. Rolling her sleeves further back on her arms. Looking around her lemon-yellow themed bedroom. Sitting in the corner were two large painted white wooden bookshelves, stuffed with books. The books were mostly fiction, from were the girl was sitting she could see copies of _The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring, The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King_ all by JRR Tolkein grouped together. She also had copies '_Of Mice and Men'_ and _'An Inspector Calls'_. Sitting on top of a small bureau were piles of notebooks, filled with the girls handwriting. The notebooks contained Hermione's thoughts on the world and observations of the world surrounding her. The girl's normally large-bushy hair was sitting behind her head in a tight ponytail.

Sitting on the girls lap was a small red leather-bound notebook, within the book Hermione was writing her latest entry.

_Dear Diary,_

_I starting to feel very worried, I have all of this literature and none of it is telling me what is wrong with me. It's like I'm some kind of psycho at times! Whenever I feel a strong emotion beginning to stir within me, like anger, hatred, rage, fear, happiness, love strange things begin to happen. I can't understand it but for example when someone takes a book from me, if I don't want them to take it from me, it zooms back into my waiting hands. If I'm trying to read under my bed covers a strange flickering ball of light lights up so I can read._

_I have even scanned some medical textbooks, so far nothing has turned up, although I have not yet given up hope, just because I haven't yet found anything that explains adequately my 'symptoms' for want of a better word, although I really do not believe that I am sick. I can say though that I have noticed my Grandmother giving me some funny looks when I start to randomly display these abilities. I think she might have some clue as to what is up but she hasn't quite told me what she thinks it is. I just really want to know what in the world is going on._

Hermione looked up when a sharp knock sounded from the door. Closing the notebook and putting an elastic band round the notebook to keep it closed and to signal that it wasn't to be read by anyone. Shoving the book underneath her white pillow, she recaped the pen and left it sitting oh her nightstand. Having just completed this task, she stood up smoothing the duvet at the same time. The girl looked up right as an older gentleman dressed in a black suit came into the room. She smiled at the man

"Hello Alfred, whats up" she asked the man

"Your Grandmother and Grandfather would like to see you down in the central office"

At this point Hermione looked at Alfred startled, the central office, was the large impressive room that despite the name had a window overlooking the rear gardens. Her Grandmother used the office when she wanted to make a statement, when she wanted to hold the upper hand in a meeting. The room contained a large fireplace, and big cushy seats. Hermione's grandmother had once told her that if she was having a meeting, it wouldn't give off the right first impression if the seats that the Queen couldn't afford comfy seats. It would make the people believe that the Queen was going into meetings weak.

"What do they want me for Alfred, do you know?"

"I am not entirely sure, Miss, but it would be wise to go over, there may answers to the questions you want answers at the meeting" Alfred answered.

Alfred knew some of what was troubling Hermione, although their dialogue might be stilted the two were very close. Hermione could often see Alfred as the uncle she had never had. Alfred has made sure that Hermione learnt how to ride a bike, how to speak to people in a polite manner.

Alfred had been the families butler for as long as she could remember, at least for as long as she had been living at the palace. Alfred had taken the time to explain to Hermione why she wasn't living with her parents.

Alfred had told her that they were away. Hermione's Grandmother and Grandfather had explained that her parents had ran away shortly after Hermione had been born. At first they had money lodged into a joint checking account for them from the Queen. But that had ended when the Queen had found out that they were using the drugs to buy illegal drugs, the Queen had quickly cut them off after this.

Despite the fact that Hermione's Grandparents could have just as easily trashed her parents in front of Hermione, they had calmly and rationally told Hermione what happened. Why they weren't there. It would've been so easy to just tell Hermione that they were dead and good for nothing, but they told the truth. It was then that Hermione knew she could trust them.

Walking out of her bedroom, behind Alfred, she softly closed the bedroom door behind her.

* * *

_**The editing process began on 1/12/2012 and this chapter was posted on the 29/12/2012 and is 3,009 words.  
Oh yeah, I won't post the next chapter until I get at least five reviews (that's right I'm holding it hostage BWAHAHA)**_

_**Roma**_


	2. Chapter 2

**_Hi, sorry this chapter took so long, between Christmas and New Year, then the cold weather, of course OTs and health. It snowed here in NI, so I am frozen, the heating and radiators have been on permanently for about four days just because of snow! And if you've been following me on twitter or whatever, you'll know I pretty much shut down in the Winter between the cold and shorter days (I think I'm really affected by the snow)._**

**_Just wanted to say that I don't own Harry Potter or Michelle Obama (love her)._**

**__**_"You can't make decisions based on fear, and the possibility of what might happen"  
__Michelle Obama_

* * *

Hermione skipped out of the room after Alfred. She couldn't help feeling curious about whatever it was that Alfred was taking her to. All her life Hermione had known that something was rather strange about her. Hermione could not help but think that perhaps now she would get some answers. Hermione began to think of all the strange things that had happened in her short life. Rubbing her hands together, Hermione began to think that all of the changes that had gone on in her life prior to this point. Hermione's grandparents had been concerned, taking Hermione to specialist paediatric clinicians on Harley Street, even consulting with specialist private doctors in the US. Hermione had once got the impression from the US doctors that they maybe had some inkling of what was going on, but whatever it was they neglected to tell Hermione, or her Grandparents.

Looking up from fiddling with her hands, Hermione saw that Alfred was a good bit in front, looking back at Hermione. Alfred, was wearing his private smile, he had helped to look after Hermione from close to birth, he knew how her mind worked. Alfred stood in the centre of the corridor looking back at Hermione with his arm outstretched. Hermione had put on a sudden burst of speed, she was embarrassed about her 'lolly-gagging' and wanted to catch up.

"Come one my dear, we'll never get there in time, if we should continue to day dream en route to the meeting" Alfred laughed.

"I know, I know, but sometimes it's good to stop and smell the roses you see. I'm just taking care of my mental wellbeing!" Hermione defended herself

"Yes, my dear, but you see we are in the Palace, we are within the interior. Therefore we do not get the smell of the roses or the grass. You can not even smell it with this new air freshener" Alfred really didn't like air fresheners, he was convinced that they weren't actually getting rid of the bad odours, the kind that came from running an active palace/house/tourist attraction. He thought that the scents were merely being covered "and I haven't got round to changing some of the flowers up here yet."

Hermione just listened to Alfred, as he started to talk about some of the duties he had to perform. Normally Hermione would normally listen but now she had heard Alfred giving off about what he still had to do, so many times that she had stopped listening.

"Listen, Alfred I can find my way from here, why don't you go on" Hermione laughed.

Alfred just stuck his tongue out and wandered off. Hermione thought she could hear Alfred mumbling something about the changing of the guard.

Shaking her head, Hermione glanced at the small, golden coloured wristwatch, that was strapped onto her wrist. Noticing that at least ten minutes had passed since Alfred had came up to Hermione's room, she began to lightly jog the rest of the way. Through long corridors with portraits of Hermione's ancestors and of course the current Queen at the end. Hermione came upon a small wooden door. Slowing down, Hermione straightened her dress, thinking that it had became a bit windswept on Hermione's jog through the corridors.

* * *

Pushing open the door, Hermione gazed upon a scene of her grandparents sitting in front of a large wooden desk. Her Grandmother was seated upon a plush, cushy, plump red, with cream accents high-backed armchair. Hermione's Grandfather was also sat in a plush red, also with cream accents, armchair. Hermione, knew that this room contained the office that was used when Hermione's Grandmother wanted to make an impact.

At least when guests came in, guests who came to meetings, that Hermione's Grandparents wanted kept a secret, it was situated at the back of the Palace, with almost a mile of garden at the back. So the paparazzi couldn't see in, the kind of telephoto lens that they would need, if they managed to scale a tree near the Serpentine in Hyde Park would be astronomical and pretty obvious from a distance. Of course that was assuming that there were no trees dotted in the back garden, there were large Oak trees planted at the bottom of the garden for about 500 yards. The trees would look as if they were randomly planted, but were actually strategically planted to afford the Royal family a sense of privacy.

Moving round the large wooden desk, Hermione sat in a comfortable cream, high backed armchair, with red accents on the seat. The arm was in between Hermione's grandparents, so looking at this Hermione could assume that she was somehow the focus for this meeting. Sitting across the table was a stern looking woman with her brown hair pulled into a tight bun, behind her head. The woman was wearing a black, pinstriped pant suit, with a stern expression. Hermione had noticed however that the woman's blue eyes looked somewhat vacant and dull, she thought that the woman had maybe experienced some kind of loss throughout her life, one that had deeply traumatised the woman. The woman's eyes were darting round the room, taking in everything.

Coughing to clear her throat, Hermione sat down, folding her hands in her lap, she looked over at the woman.

"Hermione this is Ms McGonagall, she wants to speak with you and us, your Grandfather and I, as your guardians." Hermione's grandmother explained.

"Yes, my name is Minerva McGonagall, but we're not here to talk about me. Tell me Hermione has anything ever happened to you that you don't understand? Anything ever happened when you've been emotional, that you don't feel that you can logically explain away?"

Hermione nodded, somewhat confused that the new woman, with the slight Scottish accent that seemed to come out more when she was pronouncing her 'R's and 'S's.

"Look, I just want to tell you, and listen to me, I know this may sound a little crazy but I'm being serious here. You have magical powers, in fact so do I."

At this point, McGonagall levitated a small pencil off the desk

"There are a whole community of people living with Magical Powers out there, we are known as Witches and Wizards. Though not in the sense that your fairytales would have you believe. I for example am a witch, yet I don't eat little children and live in a house made of gingerbread cookies! Very unhygienic, and impractical, I'm sure you can understand that, living in a house made of sweets HA! Now I am here to tell you, that, in order to learn how to control your powers, there is a special school that you can go to, somewhere in Scotland. You have been accepted into this school, which you will be starting in a little over two years. It is a boarding school, I teach there, I am a Transfiguration Professor and the Deputy Head."

Hermione looked at her Grandparents, relieved that at last she had some kind of information about what was affecting her so much. Thinking quietly to herself, Hermione was thinking about this new information. Startling her out of reverie Hermione's Grandmother spoke

"That's fine and well, but I am a little concerned about Hermione being away from us for so long. I'm concerned about people beginning to recognise Hermione for who and what she is. Will people attack her because she is a member of the Royal family and therefore connected to me?"

At this point Minerva McGonagall removed her glasses from the bridge of her nose and began to polish them, using a red tartan handkerchief she had folded inside her upper breast pocket. While using the manoeuvre for more time and perhaps to study Hermione and Hermione's grandparents.

When she was finished cleaning her glasses, she gently blew on the lenses, replacing them back on her nose.

"I am going to say that due to some of the arrogance displayed by the magical world, most people would not have any clue, in fact they don't expect much of people who come from outside to learn. To them, Hermione would just be another student. Though we do have a lot of other students who have non-magical ancestors, or at least their parents cannot claim to be magical, they may recognise Hermione a lot. I myself come from a 'mixed' background, my parents while not being magical, I had an uncle who was magical. The amounts of times that I see the magical world ignoring things like physical defences or indeed electricity."

"Okay, so we'll get her into training, but are there are subjects taught at this school, that would otherwise be taught in other schools? For example the schools in our world. If Hermione, does well in her classes, is there an option for Hermione to go onto some sort of wizarding university? Because, knowing Hermione like I do, there is every opportunity for Hermione to do well, and I don't want her brains to go to waste." Hermione's Grandfather began questioning.

"There is no such universities, although if a person wants to become a Master of their chosen subject, they can choose to study underneath a current Master, as their apprentice for a period of 5 years. I do warn you however, this is very tough to go through. And no, there are no non-magical subjects covered at Hogwarts, that is the name of the school. If Hermione feels up to it, she can however continue to study some of the non-Magical subjects, I believe it is known as distance learning. Hermione however can not leave campus, so she will have to study the textbooks on her own. I do want to point out however, that Hogwarts is a renowned musical school, if Hermione chooses to attend she will be going to one of the more successful Magical schools in the British Isles and indeed in History."

Hermione's Grandparents looked very interested. Her Grandfather closed up the meeting quickly saying.

"Can we think about it? It sounds like a very interesting opportunity but I'd like to take the opportunity to discuss it as a family.

Professor McGonagall nodded and got up out of the seat,

"We don't usually allows students much contact in the Wizarding world but if you promise not to mention it, I will give you an address for a postbox that you can use to send preliminary letters to, a postbox in Inverness. I would not normally offer this, so I really must stress that you do not mention it. I check the postbox once a week, usually on a Friday during term time, so if you send a note there and I'll hopefully be able to come."

With that Professor McGonagall stood up and removed a small piece of yellowed paper from within her suit. She placed the piece of paper on the desk and checking to make sure she had the right address wrote on the piece of paper. Rushing forward, Hermione saw that the piece of paper had wrote on it, in curling joint up writing:

_MBE, Inverness, Scotland_

There was the rest of an address that looked like it was based in a business district of Inverness, Hermione couldn't say for sure. Looking up, she saw Professor McGonagall nod a goodbye and spin into nothingness. Hermione couldn't understand it, but she knew that she wanted to talk about some more with her Grandparents.

* * *

Right when McGonagall had left, Hermione was sitting inspecting her fingernails, thinking deeply. She looked up when she had heard some things being mentioned:

"I really must say that I am not completely surprised, after all Hermione is a wonderful little girl, if she wants to do something then she will do it. Though I think that if Hermione chooses to go to this school, she will have to think long and hard about what she wants to do. We will also have to think about Hermione's training prior to leaving us. We can't very well send a security detail up with her now can we?" Hermione's Grandmother was saying

"No, we can't. Though if we do actually send Hermione up there, I want her to have some ability to protect herself and needless to say but I want Hermione to be able to make her own friends, free from wondering if they are properly her friends." Hermione's Grandfather mused thoughtfully.

"I would most definitely want to go up to this castle, I am already practised in and have already been doing karate, but that was more of an interest than anything. All my life I have wondering if there is something wrong with me, now I know and I would like to explore this option." Hermione answered confidently knowing what she wanted.

* * *

Over the passing week, Hermione thought long and hard about what she wanted to do. She spoke to her Grandparents and spent a good deal of time considering all of her options. Hermione knew that she wanted to do this, that she definitely interested in going, but she was completely interested. Alfred had told Hermione that if she was interested in doing this, then she should just go for it. Hermione really couldn't hide her interest but she wanted to do some reading up on it first.

As Hermione hadn't technically entered the Magical World yet, she couldn't have access to any texts about her new world. Which Hermione needless to say she thought was quite daft, she thought that if a person was moving to a new country like Northern Ireland or Japan or just thinking about such a move, then they would read up on their new country. Read up on things like, the healthcare system, if they had children the education system, the geo political system, the economy or anything else related to said country before they even made the decision to uproot themselves. Hermione thought that a person should know or at least know of all the contributing factors about the new place they were living. Heck, Hermione thought that if a person was moving from London to Manchester, then a person would want to look at where the major hospital were, if they had children or wanted children, where and the school system was like, if there were still partying (or partying at all) and in the twenties, or going to university what the pub and club scene was like.

Nevertheless Hermione thought that this was maybe quite strange, the only thing that she could find was some of the literature from Medieval Times about Witch Burning. But that wasn't even original, it was a copy of the original, in some cases a copy of a copy. Hermione thought that was maybe quite strange, after all she should be able to find some texts, but the majority of them were fairytales you tell to young children to get them to go to sleep. However, Hermione had noticed her Grandmother watching her when Hermione would sit in the private library reading these texts. Hermione's Grandmother was also hinting at some texts that she had gotten because she was handing Hermione secretly, some heavily censored files. Hermione could see some of the names of the players within this world, but was not entirely sure as to what the whole story was.

Hermione had also noticed that within these documents she was given, they were quite spotty, not like a bottle of ink had been spilt over them, but that sometimes the information given was incredibly redacted, to the point of where the reader, or Hermione supposed her Grandmother was treated incredibly stupid. There also times when more meetings were held between a Hermione's Grandmother and the acting Prime Minister. Hermione noticed that occasionally a third name would change, a name Hermione wouldn't recognise. Some of these names held more meetings and as a result their files were thicker. Thankfully Hermione had worked out fairly quickly that these files were just copies. Some had more information redacted and despite Hermione getting fairly excited at first, that she had came across a few files that didn't have the irritating black stripe indicating some form of information that had been withheld, but she quickly realised that there was no decent information to be gleaned from these files. Hermione also noticed that some of the dates that these third names, who she had worked were the ministers, had irregular time dates. For example, some would only be serving for a matter of months, before another came in. It was all very chaotic. Some could be serving for years. There was information given about what would happen later on to these people.

* * *

One day Hermione had came across her Grandmother sitting in one of the gardens, surveying the surround area were various members of her Grandmother's personal security team. She struck up a conversation with the woman, fully intending to learn some more of what the files meant.

"Hello, Grandmother, lovely day isn't it? Could I speak to you some more about those files?"

"Yes, it is, now sit down and sit up straight dear" Hermione's Grandmother was always looking at a woman's poise "I am afraid I can't give you a lot of informational, the information was in those files, was for the most part very ministerial, but I'll try to answer your questions, at least the ones that I know the answer to and am allowed to share."

"Well, Grandmother, I wanted to understand what some of the files had information contained within them that was blacked out, but I suppose you've just answered that haven't you? I also wanted to ask what kind of impression you got from the people living in the magical world, or at least the ones that visited."

"Well, my dear, some of the people who visited were more friendly, they are the ones with more files and of course more information contained within. They were some that just came and introduced themselves because they had too and carried a very arrogant, superior attitude towards myself and the Prime Minister. Now you also have to understand that if the Magical World was facing a crisis that could affect the non-magical world, then we were informed as a matter of due process. If we were experiencing some kind of crisis here that was having some kind on the Magical World, then the Minister of Magic came through. For the most part though some just left it to us."

"So the attitudes aren't that great? I won't be likely to face persecution and racism in that world will I, Grandmama?" asked Hermione worriedly.

"I am afraid that you could face some racism, but I don't think it will result in any physical persecution. Though I still want you to take advantage of some physical training irregardless of whatever world you are in. And I got the impression that, in the Magical World, it was assumed that us non-Magical folk still lived in a time bubble maybe in the fifteenth century I think."

"It's certainly a lot to think about. Is there anything else I need to think about?"

"No, it is entirely up to you, but if you do decide to enter into this world, I want you to see a Lawyer first, just in case and to discuss our options, of course it would probably have to be a magical lawyer."

"Sounds fair enough, do you have anyone in mind?"

"Yes, I have gotten the name of a lawyer, whose office specialises in these types of things. I believe it is attached to a fairly large company. Malfoy industries, I believe. A Lucius Malfoy and John Smith I should think."

"Malfoy? Yes, that ought to be fine I should think."

"I will set up an appointment for later."

With that the rain came on and the two women had to go inside.

* * *

**_This chapter is 3,328 words and was posted on the 20th January 2013. I've checked any references and the postbox service that I referenced does exist today, but I'm not sure if it existed in 1988. I want to recommend reading 'Breakfast In New York' by Radaslab, it's a Harry/Hermione that isn't for Ginny lovers._**

**_Reviews are always welcome!_**

**_Roma_**


	3. Chapter 3

_**Hey! Sorry this took so long to post, extremely busy and writers block. But I have good reasons, which I'm not going to bore you with! Anyway I'm off to watch a 'The Who' documentary tonight, so enjoy here.**_

_**"It is a pleasant world we live in, sir, a very pleasant world. There are bad people in it, Mr. Richard, but if there were no bad people, there would be no good lawyers."**_

_**Charles Dickens**_

_**I don't own Harry Potter, or Charles Dickens, anything that you recognise I don't own!**_

_**Enjoy**_

* * *

Hermione had been spending her whole summer thinking of what opportunities could come up now that there was something else out there for Hermione. One of the thoughts that wasn't far from the front of Hermione's mind, was the chance that now she could maybe make some friends, who didn't know Hermione for or more rather what she was. It would nice to make friends with some people who just saw as another girl, a random girl, not their ticket to the royal family. Hermione might have been friends with Alfred and his family and some of the other staffers at Buckingham Palace, but Hermione knew that she was being treated differently.

Hermione would sometimes have to battle against the misconception that because she was royal, she was made of glass and as such should be wrapped in bubble wrap at all times. Something that Hermione found completely irritating, she could never just get mucky, play in the dirt like the other tomboys her age. Everybody expected Hermione to act much like a Disney Princess, to never get dirty and never do anything new. Hermione really despised these restrictions, for the simple reasons that they would stop Hermione from being able to live.

It was for this reason that Hermione wanted to go, nobody would be expecting anything from her, she could be anything she wanted. Something that Hermione dearly wanted, she just wanted to be herself, to be Hermione. Not a Princess and the all the baggage that goes with it. Hermione thought that if she could be herself, her regular book-loving, having-to-know-everything self that maybe there would be some joys in the process. Of course then Hermione had to think of some of the negatives, and as with any decision there would be many.

Hermione would be attending a faraway boarding school for about eight to nine months a year (depending on vacations). So she wouldn't see her family for the length of time, despite any appearances to the contrary, Hermione was a real home girl, she loved being with her family. Needless to say Hermione quite liked to boast about them, tell people of their accomplishments. So telling, Hermione that she had to live with these people who she didn't know and not talk about her Grandparents, was difficult. It wasn't because Hermione was rather boastful about her family, but she loved them and wanted to constantly talk about them. Something that Hermione would find exceedingly difficult as time went on. Hermione would also have to be trained to protect herself, how to throw and land a few good punches in a fight, and to learn when to run when the time for a tactical withdrawal seemed necessary.

There was so much to consider, but before Hermione could seriously consider such a thing. There would be meetings galore, studying galore before Hermione could consider such a thing. Luckily Hermione was still only nine, eagerly counting down the days until she turned ten. It was in two weeks and Hermione was skipping round the palace, humming under her breath.

* * *

Two weeks before Hermione Hermione's birthday and when she turn the big 1-0 Hermione was called into her Grandmother's study. Tying her hair back over her shoulder into a low ponytail, she skipped off to the study. Knocking on the wooden doors Hermione steadied her breathing wondering what her Grandmother could possibly want.

"Come in, dear child" she heard a voice ringing out from the door. Pushing open the heavy doors. Hermione came across her Grandmother sitting at a desk with papers strewn out across the table. Her Grandmother looked up at Hermione "Hello there, Hermione, I have been thinking that we need to do something about this note, after all we have learned, I think it would be silly not to give it a chance"

Hermione smiled at her Grandmother and nodded "Yes, I am definitely interested myself Grandmother, it is an avenue that I needless to say would be very interested in exploring."

"Indeed, now I believe that I must tell you something, you will of course understand that I cannot tell you everything, just pieces. But I have been in contact with this world before."

Hermione looked up at her Grandmother and nodding thinking about what her Grandmother was saying. Hermione wondered what her Grandmother was about to tell her, and what she was keeping hidden. "I understand that you can't tell me everything, contrary to popular belief, I'm not stupid and would prefer to know most things, especially if it concerns me"

"I know, dear but you have to attempt to understand that some of the things I am about to tell you, are not - well - my secrets to tell, I won't even pretend to understand them all. But I will tell you what I can."

Hermione watched as her Grandmother ran a shaky hand through her hair, she seemed to be marshalling her thoughts. Turning to the small tea caddy behind her, Hermione's Grandmother poured herself a shaky cup of tea. She turned round and asked Hermione "What do you want to drink my dear?". While watching her Hermione replied "Milk". Nodding, Hermione's Grandmother poured out a cold glass of milk, from a bottle that was pulled from within a small white fridge, resting on the side of the tea service. Handing the glass over, Hermione's Grandmother began to blow gently on her tea. She settled herself in the seat and began to look up at Hermione.

Watching the Queen survey Hermione and blow gently on the tea, she closed her eyes and sighed, thinking of what she was about to tell Hermione.

"About nine years ago, in 1980, and indeed in the years previously, Britain faced a threat from within. Needless to say it was a monumental crisis. It came from the world in which you have been invited to enter. Some of these things, I don't particularly want to tell you because of the rather large fear factor that comes with them. A very bad man, was beginning to take over and make trouble within the magical world. I think his name was uh moldemort or sorry Lord Voldemort, who wanted, basically what all evil villains want, domination. He was stopped, but unfortunately for the most part that is where my knowledge ends. You see the Minister of the Magical World changed after this time, if you think much like Wartime Britain, from after the Second World War, from Churchill to Atlee, people thought that since for the most part the war was over, they wanted a different leader, not a wartime leader for peacetime. The next Minister, the current leader Fudge was and is a racist, we have had little to no contact."

By this stage Hermione had drank much of her milk, she noticed that her Grandmother was now sipping rather thoughtfully on her tea. Hermione finished the rest of her milk and remarked:

"Alright, Granny thank you at least for telling me that and not underestimating me. Now are we sending a note to Professor McGonagall?" Hermione's Grandmother took this opportunity to smile, preferring her young charge's decision to go right to the heart of the matter.

Sliding the desk chair back, Hermione's Grandmother got up and walked over to the large glass front cabinet, where the important historical documents were kept. Opening the cabinet Hermione's Grandmother bent over and daintily removed a slip of old fashioned looking parchment and a large ornate fountain pen. Hermione smiled when she saw the fountain pen being pulled out, it was only used on official correspondence when the Queen wanted to make an impact. When she wanted to impress on someone, not necessarily the importance of the Queen's personal legacy, but just when she wanted people to sit up and pay attention.

Taking both the parchment and the large black fountain pen back to the desk, Hermione's Grandmother smiled. Setting them down on a cleared space of the desk directly in front of where she would sit. Hermione's Grandmother proceeded to go over to a small cabinet and pulled out a small pot of ink. Placing the ink pot beside the large fountain pen, Hermione's Grandmother sat down. Pulling the ink bottle directly in front of her, she gave it a small shake and unstoppered the small pot. Inking the pen up Hermione's Grandmother looked up towards Hermione.

"We want to write this letter, in such a way that makes it clear that we are still in charge, while we may want more information, we still want to held in some manner of respect. You see my dear? We don't want them to disrespect us, now do we?"

Hermione laughed and asked "So what do we write?"

"There we go, now have a look at that!" Pushing the small letter that she had been writing across the table at Hermione. Gently pulling the letter towards her, Hermione read:

_Dear Professor McGonagall,_

_We would like some more information, if you can give us any more information about this new world. If you would like to come before Hermione's tenth birthday in two weeks._

_Her Royal Highness, the Queen of England._

* * *

The following week Hermione was to be found sitting within her Grandmother's study again. The wait was driving Hermione crazy, she was getting really nervous, waiting on Professor McGonagall to turn up. Sitting with her hands in her lap Hermione could be seen to be fiddling with her fingers, clenching them and massaging them out in her lap. Hermione's Grandmother sat across the desk briefly looking over some notes before their guests turned up.

There was a sudden crack and Minerva McGonagall appeared into the room, she took a breath and straightened her robes out. Once the old professor has smoothened out her robes, she lifted a hands to straighten her glasses. Coughing gently, Hermione's Grandmother folded up the piece of paper that was in her hands. Placing the letter safely within a wooden box which was placed in a cupboard that was connected to the desk. Locking the cupboard, she spoke up "We have indeed decided that our Granddaughter should be allowed to enter the magical world, but we need some assurances first, I'm sure you understand..."

"Okay, well just let me fill you in on some of the surrounding mysteries. First off, for at least eleven years, we are not sure if it goes on before that, there were instances of mysterious deaths, they could be He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named or more rather the self-styled Lord Voldemort, but he could never be tied to them." Professor McGonagall began to explain.

"Don't worry the American gangster Al Capone was involved in gangs, possibly murdered some other men, but was only arrested and subsequently imprisoned on tax evasion..." Hermione interrupted

"Right, I don't actually know about that. Back to my story, Lord Voldemort was killing people left, right and centre, literally. He was hiring students from within the school, but the group who were called Death Eaters, were essentially terrorists, this led to a rather dangerous situation in the school. The headmaster of the school was and still is Professor Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, who defeated Gellert Grindlewald, in the 1940s, he was possibly the magical section of the NAZI's but that's unconfirmed. Because of some of this history Dumbledore was never questioned, because of who he was, if you disagreed with him it was bad."

"Anyway, because of all this, he made some questionable decisions during the last war and since in relation to the school. Now, because of what I like to term, the 'Cult of Dumbledore', nobody has ever survived questioning of him. If anybody begins to makes noises, begins to question him, they find themselves suddenly silenced, or shipped off abroad. That is why I can't explain everything. But Dumbledore led the resistance against Voldemort, they eventually succeeded, he was stopped Halloween 1981. Notice that I don't say killed, because a body was never actually recovered, so I cannot say if he is completely 100% dead."

"I don't want to go through into this in too much detail, considering how a young family was changed that night. Privacy you understand. But what I can tell you is that not everything as it appears." Professor McGonagall finished her explanation and reached out for a small glass of water that had been placed in front of at the beginning of the explanation. Taking a rather dainty sip, she laughed "Sometimes, you just have to have a small drink!"

Hermione and her Grandmother laughed understanding what the horrible feeling of a parched throat. The phrase 'Water, water, everywhere and not a drop to drink!' came forward to Hermione's mind. She smiled and said "Well, I think I am very interested in this, to be sure. But is there anyway that I could meet with a lawyer who is skilled both in this world and at home?"

"Yes, it is very important that I keep my beloved Granddaughter safe, from a thoroughly legal standpoint, I want to find out what can be done to keep her safe."

Listening to the two females, Professor McGonagall close her eyes, opening up her eyes.

"Alright, well the best person that I think of is, well maybe I don't think that I can explain this next part adequately, can I invite another?" Hermione's Grandmother nodded, "Certainly". Removing a long thin stick from her pocket, Hermione watched the Professor gently tap the wand against the inside of her right wrist. A second later the Professor stuck the wand back inside her robes. "An important colleague is coming." she merely explained. Sitting back in the seat, McGonagall smiled at Hermione's Grandmother while removing a small pocket way from within her breast pocket. McGonagall looked at the black and white dial and watched the gold second hand slowly tick past.

With another crack in the small room. A tall man with black shoulder length air span into the room. The man was wearing black robes with them pulled up tight to his neck, Hermione thought that maybe he had something to hide. The man's hair, which looked slightly greasy, like he had maybe brushed through it a little too hard that morning. When the man had regained his poise, which was tall and imposing, he fished another small pocket watch out. Look at small face, Hermione watched as the tall man seemingly nodded at himself and sat in a seat.

Hermione watched as McGonagall gently laid a hand on the man, seeming to warn him to be on his best behaviour. Hermione could only wonder why this man was being warned to be on his behaviour. He drawled out a slow

"Does she know yet? Does she know of the connection?" sounding increasingly worried by the end of his speech. Hermione noted that by his dress sense, the way he carried himself and spoke. He was possibly someone whose family was maybe regarded as some kind of money. Though the man was not brought up round this money. Hermione thought that maybe he carried some kind of cross on his back.

Hermione thought through the things that she had learnt, as she had begun to sort through some of the information. Tuning back into the interview, Hermione mentally chastised herself for not paying attention to what could potentially be a very important meeting. She listened as the man opened his mouth and spoke in a measured voice, not enough to be arrogant but enough to make other people pay attention.

"Hermione because of who you are, I want to share some very important information with you. Do I have your permission ma'am?" Professor Snape politely questioned Hermione's Grandmother. Hermione lifted her head, making her head turn round watching the two adults in the room, she felt like she had been left out of the loop. Hermione really didn't like the feeling that she had been left out of some important information, especially once she found out that the information concerned her. At the back of Hermione's mind she could vaguely hear her Grandfather speaking "I'm sorry, but is there some connection?".

Startled Hermione realised that her Grandfather was in the room, he nodded his apologies, briefly explaining "Sorry, I had a very important meeting to attend". Hermione nodded to him as he made his way to a seat on Hermione's Grandmother's other side. "This is Professor Snape, dear" her Grandfather extended his hand, smiling. Hermione watched the man politely incline his hand and shake the man's hand. "Okay, well look Hermione we are family members, it doesn't matter how, but you have to keep this matter secret, okay?" Hermione could only run a shaky hand through her hair. "But, right now that doesn't quite matter."

Hermione almost cricked her neck, looking up so quickly and suddenly. "For now I want to introduce you to someone, a lawyer, now this man is deeply embedded in the enemy's side. Well, he was. Now that part doesn't really matter. He is an ambiguous, pragmatic, ambitious man. He is a good friend, we met before this war had properly started. I wouldn't properly trust him as far as I can trust him, but still I'd trust him, conservatively granted. We're going to meet him, you will then be undertaking a rather large lesson plan, you need to learn how to close your mind."

"Well, why do I need to meet this man? The way you're describing him, he sounds as slippery as a snake?" Hermione questioned, completely ignoring the whole family issue. Hermione could hear Professor McGonagall snort, "Oh, I like her, can we keep her?" Hermione's Grandmother suddenly laughed

"Sorry dearies, but we like her too much to give her away!" Hermione's Grandfather's lip curled into a slight smile. The group shared a small laugh. Hermione gave a weak smile. Slowly the group began to make plans for Professors Snape and McGonagall to bring Hermione and meet with the lawyer the following week.

* * *

The following week Hermione was sitting waiting in the same study for the Professors to show up. Hermione had washed her hands countless of times and pulling a small bottle of hand cleanser out of her pocket, she squirted a little bit into each hand and rubbed them together. Once the gel was dried into both hands, Hermione replaced the small bottle into a small inner pocket of her jacket. Watching as the Professors span into the room, Hermione stood up and when Professor McGonagall told her to "take my hand, there will be a slight squeezing sensation but you shouldn't feel nauseous at the end, unless of course you have ate a very chocolatey dessert within the last three hours."

Hermione shook her head in the negative signalling that no she had not ate anything like a, pigs swimming in Nutella in a Kit-Kat barrel, in the last three hours. Clasping the Scottish teacher's proffered hand, Hermione gulped down the nerves that she was feeling. As Hermione prepared herself, she couldn't help but feel a little nervous. Shooting Hermione what was clearly intended to be a reassuring smile. Snape looked round at the two women and nodded at them, quickly spinning with a muffled sounding crack.

Professor McGonagall took this opportunity to quickly spin out, her reasoning was probably to not allow Hermione's nerves to begin taking over. Shooting Hermione an apologetic glance, Professor McGonagall dropped Hermione's hand. While the adult were gathering their nerves, Hermione took the opportunity to glance round at her. Hermione could see that they were standing in one of the business districts of London, given that it was a half hour after lunch, the place was empty. Nevertheless Hermione was not going to take any risks and quickly pulled out a small pair of sunglasses. Placing them over her eyes Hermione continued to look round, she noticed a few delivery men hurrying to make their deliveries before they could clock out. A handful of beggars were sitting at street corners watching others, hoping to get enough money for their next meal.

Suddenly Professor Snape performed an about face and charged off in the other direction. Shrugging Hermione began to follow him. They charged past small sandwich shops, independent coffee shops, where the workers were busy cleaning up. Charging past the ATMS with scattered receipts of purchases, littering the surrounding area.

As Snape suddenly ducked into a medium sized building, Hermione followed him, they emerged into a large marble foyer. Thinking that the place showed some kind of wealth, Hermione glanced at the large chrome desk that sitting near the back of the room. Hermione watched as a harassed looking secretary was sitting behind the desk, pecking away at the keys on a large, clunky looking computer. The man quickly looked up at the trio as they made their way across the marble floor. Snape had a whispered conversation with the man, who checked something on the large monitor, he whispered back at Snape and pointed at a bank of elevators behind him.

Snape nodded at the man and uttered a polite "thank you" leading the other off towards the lifts. When they had boarded the lift, Hermione noticed that Snape pressed the button for the 10th floor. The lift was smallish, with gold plating on the ceiling. On the back wall of the elevator was a large floor to ceiling mirror. Turning back round, Hermione noted that when the doors closed they, looked like they were made from, at the very least painted to look like expensive mahogany.

Rising up through the floors, Hermione noted that a small easy-listening moderate jazz song was playing. Checking that her sunglasses were safely back in her pocket. When the lift had stopped and the elevator doors had moved, Hermione moved out into a quiet waiting room, taking a seat beside McGonagall. Hermione picked up a copy of the financial times and flicked through it disinterested. After a while Hermione picked up on what she was doing and put the yellow newspaper back down, smiling to herself. Hermione wasn't yet ten and didn't have the interest in the economy to read the newspaper.

After a while Hermione got bored in the silent as the grave waiting room and began to look round at some of the artwork that cover the walls. She could see a painting of a beautiful castle that was lit up at night, along with several of the same manor house. Hermione could see paintings of war scenes. She wondered who could possibly own the office. Hermione could see that whoever owned the office was clearly very wealthy but still wondered who it was. The seats were the same rather uncomfortable seats you might find in a hospital waiting room. You know the ones that don't allow you to become comfy while you're waiting, they're either too hard or cushioned and extra itchy.

As a man appeared at the entrance to a corridor that dimly lit and indicated to the group that they were supposed to follow them. Hermione got up and followed the silent man along with her two companions. The man led them to an office and gestured for them to sit down, just as Hermione was beginning to wonder if she had left the world of noise behind her. A door behind the desk opened.

* * *

In walked another man, with a shock of white blonde hair. He strode over to the desk, as if he was a man who was well used to mixing in aristocratic circles. The man looked as if he had a lot of money, and he wasn't ashamed of it in the slightest. Sitting down gracefully in a large leather back chair, the man spoke:

"It's good to see you Severus". Hermione noted that the man spoke with a kind of honeyed drawl, like he was used to getting his way and dam-nit he liked it. The man had deep silver eyes that looked like he had seen too much in his life.

Severus suddenly let out a rather cultured laugh "It's good to see you Lucius too, hope you've been keeping well but I'm afraid that this isn't a social visit"

"Is it ever my old friend?" the man called Lucius sat back in his seat, clasping his long manicured fingers together. He looked over at Hermione and Professor McGonagall and raised one skinny eyebrow up in the air as if he was wondering what was happening.

"Lucius, we are looking to start young Hermione here in the magical world. Now because of who her family is, we want to make sure that she will be legally safe." At this point Professor McGonagall looked over to Hermione to find out if it was okay to disclose any more information, when Hermione nodded at the Professor she continued "Hermione here, her Grandmother is the Queen of muggle England and such related territories. We want to be able to protect her from any instances, as such we want to be to hide her identity. Is that possible?"

Lucius Malfoy leaned back in seat and thought "It should be, but she will need to know about some of the elements within our world. If you come back in a week, I shall hopefully know some more of what I can do."

With that being settled the group walked out of the offices.

* * *

_**This chapter is 4,244 words and was posted on 23/2/13. Sorry it took so long and just ends, you know when you've got the writing bug but it tails off and you don't know what to write? Yeah, that happened today, anyway, review and tell me what you guys think!**_

_**Roma**_


	4. Chapter 4

_**Hi there! I just want to apologise for my lateness in getting this chapter up but March was not a kind month to me, with sickness (I had a really bad cold for a week) and then the snow (I'm sorry but who ever heard of a White Easter?!). I think I gave a better explanation though in the small oneshot I wrote 'Learning to walk again'. I can claim no ownership to Harry Potter, the Royal family. Eagle eyed readers may spot that I've paraphased a quote from Will Rojers, tell me if you get it!**_

* * *

_**"Chance favours the prepared mind"  
**__**Louis Pasteur**_

* * *

It was just over a year on, as Hermione lay in bed and thought about the year that had past. She had learnt how to run, how to use some self defence techniques. Hermione had also learnt that sometimes it wasn't exactly smart to listen to her instincts. Sometimes it was actually braver to run rather than to fight. Hermione had vastly decreased her time for running the 100meters. Hermione really should have been so fit and ready for anything that came her way.

Though right now, Hermione felt anything but fine, blowing her nose on a tissue, Hermione winced as her heard the noise. Throwing the tissue aside with her rather limp wrist, Hermione couldn't help but feel rather sorry for herself. It wasn't some terrible, sinister, wizarding problem but more rather the common cold. Rubbing at her throat, Hermione turned over in the bed that she hadn't moved from. For a spilt second Hermione closed her eyes, ready to go to sleep for a short time. Suddenly throwing herself in a sitting position, Hermione started hacking and coughing. Pulling another tissue out of the steadily emptying tissue box. Hermione tried desperately to clear her throat. With eyes that were red and tearing up. Hermione threw herself back into her bed with a small whimper.

After closing her eyes and managing to sleep for a while, although when she woke up Hermione was still to feel extremely tired. Alfred walked in gently sitting down a great big tray of food. He sat down beside Hermione and gently nudged her awake. When Hermione sat up, he brushed the hair from her eyes and gently tied it back in a low pony tail.

"Oh honey, how's your throat now?" he inquired

Hermione whispered and made gestures that implied it still wasn't good.

"It feels like it has been cut up with a rake and someone has tried to set fire to it with a match stick."

Alfred laid the back of his hand on Hermione's forehead checking her temperature.

"Well, you still feel very warm so here is some vanilla ice cream, it should hopefully bring your temperature down while soothing your sore throat. Now, I've also mixed in some honey to help your throat as well, eat it if you can." Hermione nodded and pulled the bowl of ice cream towards her. Sitting beside the bowl was a spoon which Hermione would use to scoop the delicious chunks of vanilla ice cream into herself.

Alfred laughed and walked up to Hermione's desk, he picked up the little tin, barrel bin and walked round Hermione's bed disposing of the used tissues. He looked over at Hermione while he was eating the ice cream.

"Now then, miss Hermione, can you put on your dressing gown and sit in the private living room for a while."

Hermione watched Alfred silently, before she pulled herself out of bed. Hermione staggered over to the back of the wardrobe and dragged on a large fluffy dressing gown.

With Alfred supporting her, Hermione felt able to make her way down to the living room. Using Alfred as some kind of human crutch, they slowly made their way down. Of course once they got to the living room, Hermione was overcome by a rather bad attack of coughing. Spluttering Hermione managed to sit on the sofa, pulling her legs up on the sofa, Alfred covered Hermione in a small blanket. Gently stroking her hair back, Alfred told her to rest. Hermione lay herself down in the blanket, knowing that she wouldn't get back to sleep, she closed her eyes and began to think.

* * *

_Professor Snape, or more rather her uncle as she had recently found out, had undertaken the task to teach Hermione how to block her mind. It had been a hard task. Her uncle had taken the whole tough love mantra very seriously, he had started by just pointing a stick of wood at her, which she had learnt was indeed his wand. With a short cry of "Legilimens" Hermione could feel some sifting through some of her most innermost thoughts. She thought that the sensation was rather similar to someone watching a movie of your life, or reading a private diary that was never meant to be seen by anyone else. It was rather intrusive._

_After such a session, Hermione's Uncle had explained that he did not expected her to be to throw him out but that he had wanted her to get an impression of what Legilimency was like. Her uncle had explained that it was the practise of occlumency that would guard your mind from people taking a peek inside your mind. Hermione could see that it greatly annoyed her uncle when it was described as the act of mind reading._

_Severus' upper lip curled a little as if he was truly disgusted with what he was saying, Hermione could remember that he had fairly spat out_

_"That is such a Muggle description, from the words of the people in your carnivals and circuses who claim to be magical, when they are no more than sleight of hand tricksters and of course confidence tricksters. The act of legilimency is much more subtle, a closed mind could not possibly understand such things, to learn the defensive system of Occlumency, your mind must be open to all possibilities and not shut opaque."_

_After this explanation Hermione began to slowly understand._

* * *

As Hermione lay back on the sofa she began to meditate, she had to learn to take away from her emotions, to not let them guide her. In this respect, Hermione was lucky that she had always thought about things logically, she hadn't exactly been one to let her emotions guide her. As Hermione felt the emotions leaving her drained body, she thought about the next part of advice.

"What you must create in order to protect yourself, is some kind of mind-scape, or a defence system against those who are willing to break into your mind"

With this thought in mind Hermione thought about some of the old maps that she enjoyed looking at. Hermione liked to imagine one the Ancient Roman Empire. From her studies Hermione, replaced the names with their Roman/Latin language terms. From her sessions of reading the bible, Hermione had found the whole thing rather interesting and had subconsciously remembered some of the place names. Hermione could also remember looking at the map at the front of the Hobbit book and had memorised that as well. When Severus, discovered this he had told her-

_"Use your interests like maps to help you organise your thoughts. If you can organise your thoughts then you can potentially put a stumbling block on a bout of passive Legilimency, by that I mean when a magical being is conducting a rather large mind scan, of a large number of minds in a rather large room. I dare say though, if someone is to attempt to perform a concentrated attack on your mind, you sadly willed not be able to adequately defend yourself for any substantial length of time."_ Hermione thought this was fair enough, she only wanted to keep her innermost thoughts private, after all.

Hermione had started to imagine great open spaces, large green fields that swayed in the Springtime breeze. The fields were coated with untouched snow that looked like clean vanilla ice cream in winter. Laughing children running round in the summertime, playing games with each other, during the hot summer days. She could see vast libraries that were filled with all different kinds of knowledge. Libraries that were ruled by the Dewey Decimal system within the nonfiction shelves. Books organised by author, then subject. Ancient libraries that had shelves stacked with yellowing scrolls filled with the kind of information that people would travel miles for just to read.

Smells like fusty, musty creaks were stacked up. Where you could smell your Grandparents in their nursing home. The pleasant scent of a hospital, when you knew that you were just there for a routine appointment, nothing too worrying. The smell of a freshly mown lawn in the springtime. The smell of some Hot Chocolate in the mornings. Hermione had plenty of happy memories to base her mind defences on. Hermione would place her defences like her mind was a massive map, much like Middle Earth, Hermione had once been obsessed with the book series.

Eventually all of Hermione's mediation attempts had worked and she had slowly been able to get better. Her uncle had told her that he had some potions that she could've used to get better quicker, the potion being Pepper-up potion, but given that Hermione had a rather unfortunate allergy to liquorice was largely to blame. So Hermione had to toughen it out. She had of course taken to including oranges in her diet, not particularly wanting to get sick again. Of course her Grandfather had rather annoying taken to reminding her that oranges and limes should've already been a part of her diet, she wasn't a pirate for heavens sakes!

* * *

Several weeks had passed since Hermione had caught the cold, it was now mid-May and Hermione was standing inside the gymnastics gym tucked behind the palace. As Hermione tightened the grips on her hand, she began to stare up at the uneven bars, this was the tricky one that she could never get quite right. Hermione would always manage fall on her ass when she tried to somersault the bars. While Hermione might not be competing at a professional level, she didn't think that she was good enough, it would be nice to get her 'tricks' done just right.

While Hermione was soaring through the air she found the time to think some more of what Lucius Malfoy had told her

_"Hermione, dear you must be extremely careful about who you place your trust in. You don't want to trust one person with everything, only for them to throw it all in your face. The people who you have built up round you home, you can trust them but once you enter the wizarding world, all bets are off. For example, Professor McGonagall is a brilliant woman, but because she is a teacher and a woman, some people may make the mistake of belittling her. She is very talented and I wouldn't want to meet her on down a dark alleyway!"_

_"Alright, well why are you telling me this? Is the wizarding world sexist and possibly misogynistic and old-fashioned in their actions towards woman?" Hermione questioned._

_"Yes, you are only ten at the moment" here Hermione gave Mr Malfoy a very dirty look, knowing full well that she was probably smarter than most ten year olds "but in the Wizarding World, you're public image is everything. Because myself and Professor Snape made a mistake almost fifteen years ago, we are still seen as evil men who like to torture young children, or in my case who paid of a lot of money to keep ourselves out of prison, in Severus' case hide behind more powerful men's skirts to stay out of prison."_

_"You have heard something of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named haven't you? He started making waves and coming round about twenty years ago. He was what is known a blood supremacist. He believed that people who were magical and still carried some muggle blood, from muggle parents or grandparents, did not deserve to live. In fact, he believed that Muggles, or people who were not inherently magical did not deserve to live."_

A few weeks after Hermione's eleventh birthday, her birthday falling only a few weeks, two in fact, after the cutoff date, meant that she was older for her age. Hermione had been taken to see Mr Malfoy again, whereby he explained further what he meant by some of these remarks.

_"Now, when you enter the magical world, there is no black and white, you can not trust one person with everything. I have explained to you about the Dark Lord, unfortunately he wasn't born dark, I am sure you have read up on the Nature versus Nurture debate? Whereby a child could born from a completely evil family, but because of how they are brought up, they are able to fine, upstanding members of society? Unfortunately we have to look a bit deeper in the Dark Lord's past in order to explain this."_

_"There is no denying, that the Dark Lord's mother came from what would be an intrinsically evil family, or at least they fancied themselves as evil. His mother, herself, was rather unfortunately tragically misunderstood, she had a baby but as unfortunately was a bit of a norm during the '40s she died giving birth. His father was absent, unable to trace any family, the Dark Lord was brought up in a Muggle Orphanage. I do not much about this, as the man that I knew didn't really like to talk about his childhood, but what I can extrapolate it was hard on the young boy."_

_"Not having any friends in this orphanage, no way to calm his temper, he grew up to quite an angry little boy. Now when he was brought into the magical world, he was essentially trying to differentiate himself from most of his other peers, like most other teenagers. You know, trying to be unique while at the same time not wanting to stick out too much? The boy was going through this. It didn't help that when he went to Hogwarts, he already was a bit of a bully towards the other kids in the orphanage. Now if I am to cut a long story extremely short, you must surely realise that what I am trying to portray is that not everybody is who they say they are."_

_"For example, you know I am sure that it can take a lifetime to build up a reputation but you can also destroy it in a matter of moments? Albus Dumbledore created a great and strong reputation as a force for the Light back when he defeated Grindlewald back on June 4 1944, but I think he may have greatly strayed from this by telling himself that he was infallible. Always remember that a strong person acknowledges that they can fail and have weak point, a weak person is someone who doesn't see this."_

Hermione could definitely concur, she couldn't remember the amounts of times that she had seen someone at the top of their game, only to have it destroyed by a stupid mistake. It might not have been what Mr Malfoy meant but Hermione had seen some famous faces, all fall because the Press got tired of boosting them up. Hermione didn't like to think that whatever happened she could build up a good reputation but have in destroyed in seconds because of something that she had rather stupidly done. It have the potential to become a rather large headache.

Hearing her Grandmother call Hermione into her study, Hermione gently placed the book back onto her desk and smoothing down her skirt with a hand, walked to the study. Once Hermione got in she came across her Grandmother pouring over some letter. Again, the letter looked as if it was printed on some very old style of paper, it was handwritten as well. Gesturing to Hermione to sit on a seat, her Grandmother continued to read the letter. Sitting quietly in the seat, Hermione had the opportunity to wonder why she had been called in, she had guessed that it had something to do with the letter, but she wasn't sure what.

Hermione's Grandmother looked up and said, "Professor McGonagall will be visiting us next week, to discuss some last minute things for you to prepare, here is the letter for you to make your choice." Handing over letter, she peered at Hermione through her glasses while Hermione looked down at the letter and began to read

_Dear Hermione's parents and guardians,_

_I know that we have been in touch, Hermione has decided that she will want to go to Hogwarts next educational year. A fine choice may I say?_

_What I want to discuss with you is the funding and some general housekeeping items. When I talk about the funding I mean the general funding for Hermione to attend Hogwarts, as I am sure you've gathered there is some biasm and racism left over in the Magical World. If you want to be safe, Hermione may have to go under another name. The name Windsor that is Hermione's current name may be easily recognised. I do not want to frighten you, but your enemies could lie behind every corner. You will need to be very careful._

_I feel the need to speak with you guys about some of these issues, so if you don't mind I will schedule in another appointment for the next week. At this meeting, we shall have to discuss these issues. Professor Snape shall come along with me, he shall have to explain some of his actions and behaviour in school during class and indeed term time. You will be coming into a world filled with secrecy and need to learn some of the secrets before entering this world._

_Sincerely,_

_Professor Minerva McGonagall._

After reading the letter, Hermione sat back in her seat.

"It sounds like an onion doesn't it? Peel back one layer of secrets, to find more secrets. Are you still sure you want to go through with this?" Hermione's Grandmother concernedly asked

"Yes, I am sure Grandmother, I have the opportunity to make friends and I don't want to give up on that chance. No matter how slight it may be. At the risk of sounding like an after-school movie I have always felt like I didn't belong here, but that I belonged somewhere else." Hermione's grandmother sat back in her seat and laughed

"You do sound a little bit like a corny movie dear. But no worries. I know how much this opportunity could mean to you, I won't be pulling you out, just be careful my sweetie."

* * *

_**This chapter was 3,029 words and was posted on the 5 April 2013. Sorry this was just a filler chapter, but hopefully more will happen next time, I'm starting to lose inspiration for this story, its inspires me though when I get reviews and follows hint hint! Anyway, I've also been completely obsessed with Game of Thrones, for example, I'm sat here in my new Night's Watch tshirt! I love the Songs of Ice and Fire book series, just a very slow reader.**_

_**Until next time, Roma**_


	5. Chapter 5

**_Hey, guys! I'm sorry for getting this out late, but better late than never right? There's a better explanation under this all. I think I'm going to do a singular update on first year, then two on second year and so on, review and tell me if you don't agree with this. I think I'm vastly overrating my skills as a writer here, but I hope that you don't agree with this!_**

**_Read, enjoy (and review)_**

* * *

**_"I don't think we're in Kansas anymore"  
L. Frank Baum_**

* * *

The following week saw Hermione, her Grandmother and Grandfather waiting patiently in the study. Hermione was sitting wringing her hands in her lap, wondering what Professors McGonagall and Snape would say to her this time. She already understood some of the discrimination that would come when Hermione entered into the Magical World. Not the least because was female, that may make it more difficult to deal with, but Hermione had heard that she would be passed off as a Muggleborn, something she had no problem with. Though unfortunately the people who were in Government may very well have a problem with.

Hermione couldn't exactly understand why people would have problems about what world Hermione was coming from, along with how Hermione had been brought up. Mr Malfoy had explained that some people, he had once included himself in that category, didn't exactly understand that a different upbringing made Hermione a member of a lesser species. Once Hermione had learnt of this, she had thought about some of the so-called 'racial cleansing' undertaken by the Nazi's in parts of Eastern Europe during the 30s and 40s. Mr Malfoy had explained that he could now see the proverbial 'light' so to speak.

Glancing up when the lit fireplace turned green and started to spit out the two tall Wizarding professors. Hermione glanced up and watched the Professors step neatly out of the fireplace. Watching her Uncle stepping out in his billowing black robes and sweep round to the seats in front of the desk, before sitting down however, he delicately nodded at Hermione and her Grandparents. Professor McGonagall swept out next, in a nice pair of emerald green robes, the woman curtseyed towards Hermione's Grandmother and Grandfather. Hermione's Grandmother smiled and waved her hand towards the tall Professor. Opening her mouth, the Queen asked

"Please, you don't have to curtsey to me, where and more rather why did you did you learn to curtsey me anyway?"

"I read a book on how to treat and deal with figures of Royalty and really how to deal with anyone respectfully in the Muggle world. I figured that if I should be travelling round to Muggleborn homes, I should at least learn how to act polite, you see it would help if I could come across as a not-so-crazy lady, when I am going about my work" the Professor responded. Hermione's Grandmother smiled "well, it certainly helps!"

At this point Hermione's Grandfather cleared his throat,

"Yes, quite, but we need to discuss some of the pricing for Hermione."

"Quite right, my friend" Professor McGonagall laughed "Now, Hermione, we still want you to attend Hogwarts but there a few security details that we need to go through. Now usually when a muggleborn student enters into Hogwarts, they are either under Albus Dumbledore or myself as a Guardian, this is only a Guardian in the Magical World, or they have a foster family if you will, from the magical world. Now, we would recommend, you choose a family from outside of Hogwarts."

"Secondly, I fear, the surname Windsor may be too recognisable, do you have any name you could change it too? Just to maintain the illusion that you are indeed an average student, I will need a name within a few weeks."

At this point Hermione looked over at her Grandparents worriedly, and gulping down her fear fairly whispered "Well, I hope you guys don't mind, but I was going to change my name to Granger, you know the same name as Alfred?"

"I think that sounds fine dear, as long as Alfred agrees"

Hermione one nodded looking relieved. Professor McGonagall took this opportunity to pipe up

"Good, now that we have got that sorted out we need to sort out, you getting your school supplies, given that it is now in fact June, here is your school letter, I thought I would just take it with me here today. Included is your list of books for the new school term. I also want to make sure that you are good to pay the pricing for the next school term, because I am the administration head and through me, Severus Snape here takes care of the financial gain for the school, we need to discuss fees for the school.

At this point Professor McGonagall reached into the inside of her cloak. Rooting round for a few minutes, she withdrew a yellow envelope.

_Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardary_

_Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore_

_(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorcerer, Chief Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confederation of Wizards)_

_We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardary. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment._

_Term begins on September 1st. We await your owl by no later than July 31st._

_Yours sincerely,_

_Minerva McGonagall_

_Deputy Headmistress_

When Hermione had read the letter, she silently passed the letter to her Grandmother, who read the letter while smiling. After Hermione's Grandmother had read the letter, she passed the letter to Hermione's Grandfather, whose eyes quickly scanned the letter. When he had finished the letter Hermione's Grandfather asked in a gruff sounding voice

"I'm sorry but what is a Mugwump pray tell, some of these titles of Dumbledore's sound, well slightly, made-up to be honest with you."

Hermione heard the Professors both snicker,

"I know, some of it sounds a bit made-up, but that's the way this world is."

Hermione nodded her head and placed the letter delicately back on the desk. She looked up and listened in on the discussion, Professor Snape was saying

"Okay so the base rate is 7,000G, now because Hermione's mother attended Hogwarts but under an alias, we can shave 5% off, that's 6,650G. In sterling that's £34, 784.50."

"Well, what about the families who can't afford that? It seems a bit exorbitant, is there some kind of scholarship for the families who can't afford this?" Hermione's Grandfather asked concerned.

Hermione could just guess that her Grandfather's brain may have run off to charity ideas. Professor McGonagall smiled and replied

"Yes, there is, but I'm assuming you won't need to avail of it? The coffers for this fund are running low, sadly no one donates anymore". Hermione chuckled as her Grandmother shot her Grandfather a displeased look, promising retribution. Her Grandfather mentioned

"Could we make a donation? Anonymously I mean."

Professor Snape decided to explain "No, you can't, not yet anyway. Because of the way the Fund is set up, it usually is spent as a way to spread influence. Simply because of who Hermione is and we want to keep that secret, you cannot bring any extra unwarranted attention to you"

The meeting eventually ended, with Hermione getting excited about what was the trip into Diagon Alley, that she was scheduled to go on the following week with the Longbottoms. Professor McGonagall had left behind a file with the information on the family. Hermione had quickly read through the essembled information, learning that Frank Longbottom was a full time auror, along with Alice being a part time auror. Hermione had learnt that they had a son who was Hermione's age, called Neville. They had a daughter who was nine called Annabelle and a five year old daughter called Gracie.

* * *

Hermione had learnt that while Frank knew about Hermione's royalty status, hence the reason he was protecting her. Alice, knew that she was important in the Muggle world but was not entirely sure on who she was. As far as Neville, Annabelle and Gracie knew, their father was collecting Hermione as part of a scheme to help get muggleborns assimilated into the magical world. Reading between the lines, Hermione could see that the family was Light and bloodlines didn't matter to them so much.

The next week when Hermione woke up, she threw on a pair of chinos and a blue teeshirt ready to go shopping. Pulling out an emerald green hoodie, Hermione pulled it over her head while thinking about disappointing the British weather could be. Rushing down to her Grandmother's study Hermione checked in the back pockets of her trousers. She felt the piece of paper and continued to rush to her Grandmother's study. Slowing down about two hundred meters before the desk, Hermione slowed down her breathing, Hermione walked into the study calmly.

Sitting behind her desk, Hermione's Grandmother laughed at the sight of Hermione walking in. Hermione's Grandmother could see the small beads of perspiration on Hermione's forehead. "Rushing down to the fireplace sweetie? Just sit there and Frank will be here in a few moments." Going back to her writing, Hermione's Grandmother liked to keep up-to-date with her correspondence from both retired and still working dignitaries all over the world. Watching Hermione pacing she soothed "You know, I suppose I could say that in instances like this, a watched fireplace doesn't spin." Recognising the references that Hermione's Grandmother was making, Hermione could only laugh.

Sitting down, Hermione could only continue to play with her fingers. Watching the fireplace, Hermione watched as the golden embers began to lick at the walls of the fireplace. Lost in her thoughts of how beautiful and deadly fire could be, Hermione didn't really notice when the flames briefly turned green. Spitting out a tall skinny man, with short brown hair. The man tripped over the air while getting out of the fireplace, he mumbled a quick

"sorry, I'm not the most graceful of fellows," before following it up with a quick

"My name is Franklin Longbottom, but please call me Frank, only my parents call me Franklin, but them I'm guessing you know what parents can be like about names! I am an Auror, and of course I am going to protect you during your first trip to Diagon Alley and to help you to fit in with the wizarding world. You'll meet my children Neville, who will be starting at Hogwarts with you and Annabelle and Gracie who will be starting in a few years time. My wife Alice will be with us, she knows a bit about you, just that you are special, not that you are Royal, we have a modern marriage where we try to tell each other everything!"

Frank grinned, when he said this, which Hermione thought was very odd, it wasn't exactly a modern thing to be have an open and honest relationship with your wife. Hermione had known that some people would perhaps get so engrossed in a person's work, they wouldn't speak to their spouse about some of the things that had happened to them, in their daily life. Even though a person could think that the Royal family were old fashioned, Hermione had been brought up by her Grandparents to believe that communication was an essential part of any part of romantic relationship.

Shrugging her shoulders and thinking that she was truly about to enter into a new world, Hermione stood up. Smoothing down her clothes she stuck out a hand "Hello, Mr Longbottom, my name is Hermione and I guess that I'm the girl who you'll be taking shopping amongst your other duties. By the way could you explain what an Auror does?"

"Sure, an Auror, which is my job, is to protect the peace, to police the world and its magical citizens."

Hermione's Grandmother frowned, "So, kind of like the police and military at the same time? Huh"

Frank smiled "Yes, I suppose it is and let me tell you at times, it's a thankless task but somebodies got to do it!" chuckling Frank gestured towards the fireplace "do you know how to Floo?" Hermione looked at the man and laughed nodding her head. Hermione loved the man's infectious enthusiasm, she glanced over at her Grandmother, who chuckled and laughed, gesturing at Hermione to go into the fireplace. Hermione laughed and turned to Frank, asking her what the destination was "Oh, just say The Leaky Cauldron"

* * *

Skipping towards the fireplace, Hermione took some of the proffered glittering, emerald green powder from Frank, Hermione threw some into the glowing fireplace. Stepping forward, Hermione clearly called out 'The Leaky Cauldron'" stepping towards Hermione was swirled into the fireplace, catching split second glimpses of rooms and homes beyond. When the roaring in her ears sounded like it was beginning to die down, Hermione took her weight off her right leg and prepared to step out. Hermione stepped out of the fireplace and began to smooth down her skirt. Thankfully Hermione stepped to the side, otherwise she probably would've been hit by Frank stumbling out.

Hermione looked up at the brown-haired family, waving her over. Feeling slight nervous, Hermione walked over to them nervously waving. The small woman had brown hair with lightly blonde streaks going through it, laughed "well hi, you must be Hermione right? I'm Alice, Frank's wife". Hermione laughed "Yes, I'm Hermione". Hermione glanced round at the family, she saw a boy her age, who was slightly tubby and had dirty, sandy hair, standing beside him was a girl who looked a few years younger with straight brown hair, beside the two was another girl with a long black hair that was tied back into two piggy tails.

"This is Neville, he will be starting at Hogwarts with you" gesturing to the boy "that's Annabelle there, she'll be starting Hogwarts in two years" gesturing to the girl with the brown hair "and that there is Gracie, she'll be six in February."

Pointing to the smallest girl with the black hair in pigtails, bending down to shake the little girl's hand "hello, it's a pleasure to meet you Gracie, are you ready to come shopping with us?" Gracie nodded and starting talking about one of her sick dollies.

Hermione stifled a chuckle as she saw Annabelle roll her eyes to the ceiling

"Don't you ever give it a rest about your stupid dollies? God, you can so childish at times". Hermione listened as Alice wearily reprimanded Annabelle, thinking that it was maybe this was a regular occurrence

"Belle, sweetie, you've got to be nicer to little Gracie, you were like that to, once honey."

"But, Mum I never followed you around, and I wasn't such an irritating brat all the time"

"HA, you always followed me round Annabelle, and yes you were irritating" Neville scoffed. Hermione winced as she heard the kids starting to squabble with one another.

"Kids, kids behaviour, now Hermione have you got your schools list yet?" Frank asked. Hermione smiled and reached into her back pocket. Alice laughed "Frank, dear, we need to take Hermione through to the alleyway." Hermione smiled and began to follow the family through to the rear of the bar, Hermione watched Frank pull out his wand and begin to mutter "now lets see, three up and two across" tapping on the correct bricks. Hermione glanced round the dank little backyard, there was a metal dustbin in the corner.

Hermione was suddenly startled back to attention when she saw the brick wall open up into a gaping hole, large enough for a tall adult male to walk through. Looking everywhere Hermione saw barrels of some liquid sitting outside a shop, steaming merrily away. Hermione saw shop windows packed with all kinds of strange goods, she could see vendors walking up and down yelling about their wares. It was to much for Hermione, she had to laugh, swinging her head this way and that trying to see everything she could. Noticing her distracted Neville laughed "yes, that's the way I was too."

Laughing the family strode down the alley, Hermione could see lots of different things going on around her. She could hear the shrieking coming from the vendors walking up and down, she could see some of the larger shops advertising their latest wares and deals. Walking down the cobblestoned alley, Hermione thought that the little street maybe reminded her of one of the medieval recreation tourist attractions, or even a small village on continental Europe. Of course Hermione noticed a large white building, looming up over the rest of the street. The white building reminded Hermione of some of the pictures she had seen of the Taj Mahal in India.

The family paused before the long, white sweeping steps, "Now, this is Gringotts, it's the Wizarding Bank here in Britain, it's run by Goblins, so on your best behaviour kids!" Frank told the children.

Hermione could do nothing but look up at the building in awe, she couldn't believe that the building was so clean, but got her answer when she saw a figure sweeping up any rubbish, of which there was little. Running up the steps to catch up with the Longbottom family before they walked through the large double doors.

The first doors were black, and led to a slightly smaller room that had two Goblin-looking guards dressed in their full regalia, Hermione was reminded of the Swiss Guard that protected and policed over the Vatican, they were even holding the long pikes, with the obligatory pointy bit at the top. With short silver swords attached to a belt that hung round their waist, Hermione made up her mind that she wouldn't intentionally on the wrong side of the Goblins! Noticing a poem that was engraved in gold above a silver door. Reading the poem:

_Enter, stranger, but take heed_

_Of what awaits the sin of greed_

_For those who take, but do not earn_

_Must pay most dearly in their turn_

_So if you seek beneath our floors_

_A treasure that was never yours,_

_Thief, you have been warned, beware_

_Of finding more than treasure there._

Hermione liked the fact that the poem warned about greed, one of the deadly sins if Hermione was remembering correctly. Hermione thought that the poem was warning in some kind of twisted, double speak, method that there was possibly booby-traps led beneath the great bank, or really where ever the vaults were kept.

Frank led the family into a long room, with Goblins sitting in rows, copying financial information in large leather-bound ledgers. She glanced at them inspecting large diamonds, sapphires, emeralds, rubies. She noticed a few of them inspecting large gold coins, she even noticed one tossing a golden coin aside muttering about "Leprechaun Gold". Men and women were standing in long lines, some looked very clean, while others looked like they had seen better days. Looking up towards the ceiling, Hermione noticed that there was another level, with small wooden railing, with the occasional goblin looking down.

At the very top, a long way up, was a large skylight, that let in the bright sunlight, illuminating the floor. Hermione could see a blue sky with clouds scattered on the high, light blue canvas. Walking up to a large mahogany counter, Hermione watched interested as Frank folded his fingers back over his wrist and spoke "May your vaults overflow and your enemies cower at your feet." Hermione watched silently as the Goblin behind the counter looked up and smiled a closed-lipped smile. The Goblin repeated the gesture and began to speak

"Hello, my name is Dtogaz and I will be your server today, how may I help?" Noticing Hermione looking up at him, he said "and this must be your first time at Gringotts, it is rude to stare young lady. We can help you start up an account if that is what you wish, if you could follow the signs over there, our start-up humans will be happy to assist you" Dtogaz pointed into the corner, where a small teak door was located, Hermione pointed towards the door and seeing Dtogaz, nod of assent she walked towards the door, hearing Frank follow her.

Pushing open the door, Hermione saw a small office, with one large, blonde woman sitting behind it.

"Welcome, my name is Jane and if you will please have a seat, someone will be right with you."

Glancing round the office with the cushioned chairs, with the stuffing spilling out of some of the seats, Hermione looked at some of the financial posters. They were advertising to people wanting to open up bank accounts and to the lucky few who discovered that they already had vaults, but vaults that had been lost to time and memory, at least their family memory.

After a while, Hermione and Frank were called into the room beyond where they met with the sight of a surly Goblin. They were directed to sit in the seats, where the continued to watch the Goblin scrawl some notes on a bit of parchment. Hermione tilted her head to the side wondering why he would use such items, they didn't seem practical or environmentally friendly. When the man had laid down his quill, he spoke

"Hello, my name is Ned, I will be helping you to handle your new account, now before we begin, is there any information I should be aware of?"

"Hello, my name is Hermione, I think there may already be an account for my family, we are the Royal family, is there any kind of blood test I could go through to check this?"

"Yes, there most certainly is, if you wouldn't mind pricking your finger with a small needle, here you go" Ned pushed his chair and back and walking over to a small cabinet. Withdrawing from the cabinet, Ned pulled out a yellow bin marked sharps, that reminded anybody to throw away the needles after they were used. Placing a small kidney dish, along with a glittering stone, and some gauze he settled himself back in the seat.

"Well, Hermione, if I could ask you to prick your finger on this finger, I will be most grateful, don't worry it's completely sterile. Goblins may have developed reputations for being a Warrior Race but when it comes to Banking we recognise the need to be safe, after all it wouldn't look too good, if customers were sick now would it?"

Hermione chuckled knowing exactly what Ned was referring too, taking the needle, she squeezed some of her blood up to her forefingers, thinking it was much like a blood sugar test.

Once she had pricked, she looked up at Ned and said "Alright, what do I do now?"

Ned replied, "If you could just squeeze your finger, we need a few drops on this stone, don't worry the stone is sterilised for any blood mixings after each use."

Doing what the Goblin had told her to do, Hermione squeezed her finger over the rock, which dulled down from the glittery green colour, watching the rock, she then noticed that the stone turned a deep red colour with some white flecks upon the rock.

"Perfect, now if you could hold the gauze round your finger, we don't want you bleeding anymore than necessary. If you'll excuse me, I'll just go and gather some of your results."

Hermione nodded wrapping the gauze round her finger, it was a small enough blood flow, that Hermione didn't think she would need to use the medical tape.

"I wonder why they brought the needle out, usually you just use a big ceremonial dagger when they are testing for your blood heritage. After this we'll go get your wands, alright?"

"I really can't wait to get my wand, and of course I can't wait to read my new books! It will be so exciting to get to read something new, a new kind of information."

Frank laughed at Hermione's excitement, he had gotten the impression that Hermione was a bit of a bookworm. Frank thought about how Hermione was showing the standard interest for all new Hogwarts students - no matter what world they came from, they could never wait to get their wand. For those growing up in the Magical World, the letter to Hogwarts showed that a magical world, would show that a persons magical core was beginning to settle down. Getting a wand was a sign that it hadn't just been a dream, a wand that responded to you, was brilliant, you were almost made. Continuing to watch Hermione speculatively, he guessed that for Hermione, and indeed for any other muggle born or indeed raised student, it could mean answers, a place to finally fit in with some other people their age. Having three children, Frank could guess that dealing with Accidental Magic, was a little difficult to explain sometimes. If a child who lived primarily in the Muggle world had a magical outburst could be incredibly difficult to explain away.

Frank knew that Accidental Magical outbursts were caused by sharp spikes to emotional turmoil. If a person was feeling a particularly strong, harsh emotion, like fear, or excitement, happiness, grief, really any emotion, a sharp Magical outbursts. Frank had watched Neville, who had typically displayed low-level magical outbursts, change peoples wig colours, hair colours and the colours of his clothes. Occasionally when Neville had particularly strong emotions, the outburst of the magic would be drastically more powerful. From having the potential to level homes, to changing mass swathes of gardening, Neville had a lot of power willing to burst out.

Hermione hadn't actually noticed Frank looking so intently at her, she was too busy wondering what Ned would bring her back. Looking up at the door when Ned pushed the door open and walked in.

"Well, then I have found out that you do indeed have access to some vaults. I can give you access to a smaller one, that siphons the funds from an even larger vault. Now I am afraid that I have to go against our usual protocol here, at eleven, almost twelve yes? I am not authorised to tell you much more, not at this age."

Hermione nodded wondering what the goblin couldn't tell her.

"Okay, well can we get any money out today? I'm taking Hermione and my children shopping for new school items today" Frank asked

"Certainly, take this vault key out there, you take it Hermione and do not give it to anyone who you do not trust, and a Carrier Goblin will help you gain access to your vault." Ned responded.

Hermione took the key in Ned's hands, she inspected it, it was a small bronze key that looked like it was possibly centuries old, fascinating really.

Watching Frank from the corner of her eyes, Hermione copied his movements, standing up and smoothing down her clothes. Frank walked over to the door and holding it open for Hermione, he stepped through after Hermione. Walking through the small reception room that looked like it was being cleaned up. Walking back into the large room, Frank and Hermione rejoined the Longbottom family standing waiting for them. As Hermione and Frank walked over to the family, Hermione heard snatches of conversations going on round her, they were odd, complaining about not having enough money, or for some other reason.

Drawing up the family, Hermione heard Gracie say

"Mummy, do we get to go on the cart ride? I love that ride, it's so fun!" Gracie asked

"Yes, pet, but I'm going to stay up here with Annabelle, I don't want her getting sick again, now did you take your stomach soothers?" Alice asked

"Course I did, Mummy" Frank started shaking his head with laughter.

Hermione guessed that this conversations was quite possibly a normal one, or at least normal when they were out shopping. Frank bent down to talk to Gracie "Yes, honey, you can come dow, but now we are going with Hermione, so I want you to hold her hand, just in case."

Hermione smiled at the interaction and stuck her hand out, "Oh, yes Gracie please hold my hand, I get a little nervous with heights and fast speeds"

"Oh yes, Miss Hermione, I'll protect you, don't worry it's not that scary, just going further down amongst the Earth, in soil, but you'll be in caves. There's no sunlight, but there will be lamps and I will be holding your hand!"

Hermione laughed at the little girls, bold promise to protect Hermione. She felt Gracie slide her little, warm hand in Hermione's bigger hand, noticing that it was slightly sweaty.

Following Frank and a little goblin that introduced himself as Ztudk, following them through a small door at the back of room, that two sentries were placed outside of guarding. Hermione guessed that this was the entryway through to the vaults. With Ztudk, walking through the door, Hermione followed after him and Frank. Once through the door, they were a large dark passageway, Hermione could feel Gracie's grip on her left hand tightening. Hermione could only guess that the little girl was not particularly fond of the dark. Once the door was shut, only a small chink of light escaped through the keyhole and the bottom of the door.

Walking forward a bit, Hermione noticed the flames in the small torches at the side of the rocky corridor, throwing small flickering shadows about them. Hermione watched Ztudk take a small one and walk it over to a large, cauldron filled with flames, merrily dancing round. Ztudk gently held it over the cauldron until it caught a small tongue of a flame. Raising his calloused fingers to his lip, Hermione listened as Ztudk whistled like he was calling a dog.

Immediately a cart, large enough to fit five persons, pull up to a small crossing. As Hermione was climbing in, she noticed some signage on the wall opposite advertising the various bank loans and mortgages that one could take out with the bank. Sitting on one of the benches onboard the cart, Hermione pulled Gracie to sit beside her. Listening with a smirk as Ztudk warned her fellow travellers to keep their hands and feet inside the cart at all times. The cart pulled away, tearing down through the tunnels at sickening speeds, Hermione could only feel Gracie pull on Hermione's hand.

Leaning over a little, Hermione whispered "Little tight sweetie". Chuckling she felt Gracie loosen her grip marginally on the steadily whitening hand. Racing through the tunnels at breakneck speeds, Hermione thought she saw little flickers of light every so often. At one point, Hermione thought that she may even have seen a long sustained fire glow. Looking forward to where Ztudk was sitting, Hermione could see him occasionally pulling and hauling on a small lever that Hermione guessed lent the cart some directionality. Though Hermione couldn't help but think that the cart didn't have massive amounts of steering.

Eventually pulling up outside a small door, Ztudk leapt from the cart and looked back respectfully at the remaining occupants of the cart. Stepping away from the cart with only a slight sway and wobble, she lifted Gracie from the card. Feeling the little girl sway a little, Hermione could guess that she felt slightly dizzy after the wild cart ride. Ztudk pulled a gleaming gold key from the ring placed around his waist. Taking the key, Ztudk placed it the small, unassuming key hole and turned it. Hearing a click, he stopped turning the key and placed his hand on the door, where Hermione watched the hand briefly sink into the door. When Ztudk heard the door beep, he pulled it opened, listening for a small clanking noise.

When the door was fully opened, Hermione gazed upon what looked like an extraordinary sea of treasure. Following Frank in, she scooped up some of the coins and watched them trickle down through her fingers. Frank laughed and said

"Okay, I'll put enough money into a small sack of coinage for you, that should be enough for your robes, wands and books along with a small allowance for the next school year."

Hermione nodded, think that what the man said made some sense. Walking out of the vault Hermione watched Gracie look in awe at the vault, she supposed that to see a girl with so much money was practically unheard of. Frank walked out afterwards, leaving down to whisper something in Ztudk's ear stalks. The next parts of the visit in the bank were a bit of a blur to Hermione, who was lost in her own thoughts about money and wealth in this new world. Hermione was so caught up in her thoughts that she only really noticed Gracie's hand tightening on hers every so often.

Hearing Gracie giggle and trying to push Hermione out of the small cart shook Hermione back to reality. Stepping delicately from the cart, she briefly observed Frank standing bent over, with his hands on his knees. Ztudk had noticed this as well, taking a few extra moments to send the cart back, to wherever it had originated from. When Frank straightened back up Ztudk walked the party to the door, leading back out into the rest of the bank. Hermione felt a small tapping on her waist, looking down, "you can let go now Miss Hermione." Laughing Hermione let go and made sure to thank Gracie for 'protecting' her when they were going down to the vaults.

Stepping out into the bright lobby, Hermione had to look at her feet for a while, so her eyes could adjust to the sunshine streaming in through a large sky-window. Following Frank's lead in breathing slowly, Hermione slowly began to feel fine again, she wasn't as dizzy as before. Walking out of the bank to stand on the gleaming steps, they met up with the rest of the Longbottom family, who were eating their ice creams and people watching.

"So, Hermione, have you got your letter?" Alice asked, Hermione felt the lump in her back pocket. Pulling out the letter that had little fold marks in it, Hermione read the letter that she felt she had probably memorised and could recite in her sleep:

HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY

UNIFORM

First-Year Students will require:

Three sets of plain work robes (black_

One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear

One pair of protective gloves (dragon hide or similar)

One winter cloak (black, silver fastenings)

Please not that all pupil's clothes should carry name tags

COURSE BOOKS

All students should have a copy of each of the following:

The Standard Book of Spells by Miranda Goshawk

A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot

Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling

A Beginners Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch

One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phylida Spore

Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander

The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection by Quentin Trimble

OTHER EQUIPMENT

1 Cauldron (pewter, standard size 2)

1 set of glass or crystal phials

1 telescope set

1 set of brass scales

Students may also bring an owl OR a cat OR a toad

PARENTS ARE REMINDED THAT FIRST YEARS ARE NOT ALLOWED THEIR OWN BROOMSTICKS.

Looking round in the sun, Hermione noticed that the small Alley was starting to look a little busier that when they had gone into the bank. Frank asked Hermione "Is your stomach settled enough for us to go for the robes?"

Hermione put her hand over her stomach and replied "yes, I seem to have a stomach made of steel! Or at the very least, a very strong stomach." So do we go over here?"

Frank looked over at what Hermione was pointing out, seeing that she was pointing at Madam Malkins "Yes, that's Madam Malkins, they do predominantly school gear, so you can get your robes in there, at least your school ones. And your daily robes, for the more formal occasions where you may be required to make a purchase of dress robes, you can go into Twilfitt and Tattings. Their clothes are a bit more expensive, generally more bespoke and formal. I'm not entirely sure where you may buy your fashionable robes, but you won't need them yet, so Madam Malkins!"

Laughing Hermione followed him over to the shop, the rest of the Longbottom family walking over along with Hermione. Before they walked through the door Alice spoke

"Frank, I think I'm going to take Gracie and Annabelle into Little Toys for Little Boys and Girls and then for an ice cream and we'll meet up with you outside Olivanders in an hour yes?" Gracie walked over to her to her mother and pulled on her hand. Annabelle followed at a slightly more sedate pace. Frank checked his watch and nodded "See you in an hour then."

Looking behind him to check that he hadn't lost either Hermione or Neville, he pulled open the quaint little door and ushered in the two children looking up and down the Alley Way. Hermione walked in and found what she thought looked like a older clothes shop. Around the walls, there were some robes and other parts of school uniform hanging down. In the centre of the shop, there were three mirrors placed before a stool, a small woman with greying hair was flitting round pinning up a set of robes. Standing on the stool, was a statuesque girl with longish black hair.

Smiling at the girl, Hermione, Neville and Frank sat in the little individual seats, near to a tall woman who was watching the girl try on her new robes. Finally they stopped and while the tall woman walked up to pay her bills, the girl came over to Hermione and Neville.

"Hi! My name is Daphne Greengrass, I'm starting Hogwarts this year, but I'm afraid I might not know a lot of people, more by reputation, whats your name?"

Neville eyed her over and shrugged "I'm Neville Longbottom and this is Hermione Granger, we're starting too"

Hermione elbowed Neville in the guy, she hated people thinking that she couldn't speak for herself.

"I'm completely new to this world, friends?" Hermione asked, sticking out her hand. Out of the corner of her eye, Hermione noticed Neville raise an eyebrow, reminding herself that she would have to ask Neville more about that later. Hermione felt Daphne bat away at her hand, but before Hermione could even begin to feel hurt, she found Daphne giving her a quick, gentle hug. Hermione squeezed her back and when the woman with Daphne, called Mrs Greengrass, called to Daphne that they would have to be leaving.

Accepting some of the garment bags and boxes, Daphne asked Hermione if she had an owl yet

"Not yet, but I hope to get one here today, can I write to you?" Hermione timidly asked

"Sure, if you just send to Miss D. Greengrass, The Gables, they'll reach me and I can reply!" Daphne responded. Hermione laughed storing the information inside her head. Frank had suddenly stood up to hold the door open for Mrs Greengrass and her daughter, who nodded at Frank before passing through the door. Her daughter, Daphne however smiled at Frank before following her mother through the door.

Walking back over to Madam Malkin and speaking in low tones, Hermione briefly watched the man gesturing back towards herself and Neville. Hermione wandered over towards Neville and asked him, why he had acted so odd when she was Daphne.

"Well, Hermione, I can explain this to you later but as you know there was the war and unfortunately some of the same discrimination. Some of the older families still cling onto the same old notions of superiority. I'm sorry if I offended but I didn't want you to get a totally wrong first impression of the Magical World."

Hermione opened her mouth to respond, when Neville was called up to the small platform in the centre to get his robes pinned up. Watching him, Hermione considered that Neville did not know about some of Hermione's earlier jaunts, even if they were just meetings. The meetings had ensured that Hermione would not enter the Wizarding World blind so to speak, she knew what to expect. So, she swallowed back the retort and thought that while Neville seemed very quiet and shy, he was incredibly protective. Hermione had glimpsed him round his sisters earlier and couldn't help but feel slightly pleased that Neville had taken to her so quickly.

All too soon, Hermione was called up. As she stepped up onto the small pedestal, she could see Madam Malkin's assistant was eyeing her up trying to guess at some of her sizes. As she was being poked and prodded, Hermione thought that she might find it a little difficult to get used to this kind of behaviour. Still Hermione mulled on some of the differences between the Magical and Muggle world, she supposed that among some members of the aristocracy and some social circles you would have had to watch what you said.

Hermione didn't think that she would ever be able to do that, he Grandfather frequently teased her about her brain not being completely attached to her mouth sometimes. When Hermione got nervous and excited, she seemed to have a bit of a word vomit and invariably say something that was a little awkward, or embarrassing. The same happened if Hermione ever got really angry, sure she would steam over her anger issues for a while, then everything that was wrong would just come out. Alfred had teased her about having a horrendous poker face, he had tried to teach Hermione how to play and needless to say, he had failed in that endeavour.

She was so lost in her thoughts that Hermione didn't even notice the feeling of pins jumping about on her skin and fixing her robes. Eventually she heard the woman ask if Hermione wanted some uniform to wear under the robes, looking over at Neville and Frank who nodded she thanked and gave the woman her measurements, she was a normal sized girl. Receiving the clothes, Hermione wondered how she was going to comfortably carry all of it. Stepping in Frank shrunk the bags down so Hermione could put them in the single carrier bag and easily walk with them.

Stepping out into the bright sunlight, where Hermione once again saw people walking from shop to shop. Hermione saw Frank waving at a small family across the street. Before Hermione had too big of an opportunity to wonder who the family were, Frank marched off down the street. Hurrying to catch up with, and not ashamed to admit that even this little bit of exercise left her feeling puffed, Hermione made a mental note to exercise more. Catching her breath she listened as Frank spoke.

"Okay, we've got your uniform, next I think we'll get your Potions supplies, after that we can get your trunks, then your wand, your books and then finally any familiars that you want to bring." When Hermione had caught her breath, Neville had walked briskly over to the door, he was holding it open for Hermione to walk through.

"Thank you, kind sir" she chuckled as she walked on through. Neville laughed and walked after her. Frank was already standing in the shop and had a silent chuckle when he saw this exchange happening.

Hermione looked around her, she could see the shop was organised into neat rows, glancing down through the aisles, she could see cauldrons stacked up at the back of the store, locked behind a glass door with a little gold key hole. Walking up to the counter, Hermione noticed all of the wondrous (and slight sickly smells) emanating from around her. Sitting behind the counter was a bored looking teenage girl, who was reading through a copy of 'The Potion Maker's #1 Journal', Frank walked up to the counter and turned back to smile encouragingly at Hermione who joined him in standing at the counter.

"Hi, we need two starter, size two cauldrons, and the beginner ingredients." The girl looked up, looking a little annoyed that someone had interrupted her time reading. Placing the journal beneath the shop counter, the girl grabbed a set of the golden keys. While walking to the back of the shop, the woman pick through the keys, until she got to a small golden key, which she inserted in the keyhole and pulled out two average sized cauldrons, which with a flick of her wand she sent flying up to the counter. Walking over to a medium sized display of the ingredients.

"Okay, so these are the ingredients you'll need, you're lucky you've came in earlier, you can get the fresher stuff, if you come to the counter afterwards and I'll ring you up" the girl departed with a friendly smile. Turning back to the display Hermione looked at the display and copied what Neville was doing, scooping some of the freshest ingredients into individual bags. Hermione couldn't help but think of how lucky they had been to get there so early, another few weeks, and they would probably be left with the dried up ingredients and the pre-bagged ingredients.

Handing the bags over to Frank, who brought them up to the front counter, he started speaking to the girl

"Hello, could we get some scales as well and 2 small potions knives? Is there anything else, two first years would need? They are just starting at Hogwarts in the coming September." Frank placed the bags on the counters. The girl lifted the little bags to weigh them and placed stickers on the bags, sealing in their goodies. She lifted her head and asked

"Would you like some boxes to keep your ingredients in?" Frank looked at Neville who nodded.

Hermione spoke "Yes, please, I don't really fancy having to look at fish eyes for the next month!" The girl laughed and going into a store room behind the counter, she brought out two medium brown boxes. Stamped on the front of the boxes in large, black, stencilled lettering were the words:

Parsonage's finest potions ingredients

Keep sealed and out of direct sunlight until use

Taking the boxes the girl taped them back up, and look back at them

"Alright, that will be 5 Galleons each for the ingredients, and a further eight Galleons each for the cauldrons. Not these are good quality Cauldrons, so if you treat them properly they should last you at the very least three years, that's if you don't blow them up of course!"

Sliding the cauldron across the counter, the girl gently placed the box of ingredients with the deep dish of the large sized pewter bowl. The girl then took out two large brown paper bags and delicately placed a cauldron and the box within the paper bags. Handing them to Frank who handed one to Hermione and one to Neville, he spilt the money and pulled some coins from his bag and Hermione gave him over some coins.

The girl made a careful check of the coins before she deposited them in a large old-fashioned till. "I suppose I should have asked you but where do we get some of the smaller items? Like the knives and the scales?" Frank blushed a little, becoming slightly embarrassed that he had forgotten items that were essentially crucial to their schooling. Or at least some of the more practical elements hat would be crucial for a good schooling.

The girl laughed gently, "Don't worry sir, but you can get the knife, if you want one, I'm not sure if it's still on the list. You can get the scales, the phials and the telescope in our joining shop, Quality Education Erudite Supplies or QEES for short, if you go through that door over there, and ask Brian to help you." The girl smiled at the people assembled in front of her. Frank nodded and stepped back, he checked that Hermione and Neville were both holding onto their brown, paper bags. He stepped towards the door and walked through, pushing through the string of beads, which for the majority were tied up.

Following Frank, Hermione glanced at Neville before walking through the beads, Hermione noticed the shop had windows that were half dusty like they were just being cleaned. Noticing a man flitting round the shop, with a long stick of wood peeking out from his pockets, Hermione watched as the man pointed the stick of wood, his wand, at each individual window and mumbled, watching the dust fly away from the windows. Turning back to them, the man walked over and introduced himself "Hello, my name is Brian, welcome to Quality Education Erudite Supplies, now then how can I help you?"

"We need some, crystal phials or glass phials, along with some brass scales. We have two new students joining Hogwarts and I want to be completely kitted out." Frank answered, when Brian turned his head to look at Hermione and Neville they smiled and waved at the man nervously. The man suddenly tucked his wand into his deep blue robes and began to flit away. Whistling a jaunty tune, he picked out four sets of the phials and with a flick of his wand sent them up to the counter, he then went to the front of the shop away from the counter, where he lifted out two scales.

Walking them up to the counter, he began to speak, gesticulating towards the phials.

"Now, for the scales, the glass scales are better if you don't make mistakes, they're unfortunately not as great for new potioners, only if you know that you aren't clumsy and are good with ingredients"

Frank looked at Neville, looking like he was trying to sum up just how clumsy Neville would be. With Neville's face reddening, he let out a slight squeak.

Frank laughed, "I think we'll go for two sets of the crystal phials, one for both Hermione and Neville, now about the scales?"

"Okay, we've got the two brass scales, which are good for maybe the first few years, then you make a switch up to stainless steel which are more long lasting but sadly they aren't acceptable for your first two years."

Frank nodded and watched as the man boxed them up. Placing the phials in a separate white box and gently placing a black seal over the edge. Sliding the boxes to the edge of the counter, Brian took the brass scales and placed them into two separate boxes again with a small black sticker seal.

Once he had placed the two boxes on the counter, a rather sudden thought occurred to Hermione. She glanced nervously at Frank and licking her lips to wet them she spoke "Where do we get the parchment? Or the writing supplies and utensils?" Brian nodded and walked over to a small counter to which he gestured to Frank, Neville & Hermione to follow, following him over through the tightly stuffed rows of items available to buy. "Okay, well here are your reams of parchment, we have your 4 months, 6 months, then 8 months and of course there is a guarantee that you can owl order for some more, if you should need it. So how much do you want of this parchment? It's a good schools grade, so while it won't be used on official documents, the teachers will accept this as your homework." Hermione nodded and asked if she could get enough for eight months, Hermione wasn't sure of how much she could actually write, but knowing her habits for intensive studying, she knew that she would need a lot. Neville spoke and asked "Could I get enough for four months and have the choice to order more?"

Brian nodded and said "that seems perfectly acceptable, for quills, I would recommend owl feathers, for your first year. Now this might seem a little awkward and frankly, it makes me a little nervous mentioning, but I'm hoping that you hold no blood prejudice?" Startled that the man called Brian could just come right out and say it, Frank replied "No, we're not blood prejudiced, Hermione here is muggle born"

"Okay, well can I suggest maybe using a pen or a pencil for studying work and then use a proper quill for homework."

Frank nodded and began to count off on his fingers, he looked like he was considering something. Finally Frank nodded, as if he had came to a decision:

"Okay, so what about ink bottles, I'm assuming we need some ink? And a holder or something, for the quills?"

Brian spun round and walked over to an aisle that sold things like a rainbow of different ink colours, different styles of quills, and different types of parchment. Standing in the middle of the aisle, Brian clapped his hands together and spoke

"Okay, so we have your black ink and blue ink here, along with some straight edges, there are also some cases so you can attach a small pot of ink and carry them both at one time."

Hermione nodded and smiled, implying that she would indeed take one. When Hermione was to look later, she would notice that the individual little ink pot could connect to each holder. Placing a bag in each of the young pre-teenagers arms, Frank paid Brian and led them out into the sunshine. Stepping out into the bright sunshine, Hermione freed a hand to shield her eyes from the sudden and bright light.

Frank looked up the street, shielding his eyes from the bright sun. Hermione and Neville stood round Frank, with Hermione checking the list from her pocket. Frank suddenly pulled his hand and turned his full attention to the two pre-teens and blurted out "Trunks, we need trunks, so I suggest we go and select them now and then go and get your wands and then books and pick the trunks up when we are finished with your school shopping. Now then, we will just head over here to Lignarius' Finest Trunk Makers to get your trunks."

Frank led the group to a shop with the words Lignarius' Finest Trunk Makers printed above the shop window in the finest calligraphy on a dark piece of wood. Opening the door and allowing the children to enter into the shop before him, Hermione was assailed by a smell of wood shavings and some resin. On the floor there were small wood polishing stains. Hermione thought the whole thing looked rather old-fashioned and quaint, it was rather sweet. It smelt like Hermione had stepped back in time towards some kind of old timey furniture shop. The shop probably wouldn't have looked out of place at a theme park.

Looking around the shop, Hermione noticed a teenage boy standing behind the counter making some marks in a large ledger type book. Walking over to him Frank introduced himself and the two pre-teens standing around him.

"Hello, my name is Micheal, now since it is technically my great-uncle, I'm learning how to run the shop, how can I help you?"

Frank smiled and asked, "Can we look at some of the trunks for early school-starters?"

"Certainly, will you follow me?" Micheal asked.

Following him over to a small display of the trunk placed against the back wall, Micheal took out a small yellow cloth and began to clean his hands of the oil and ink that was splattered across his hands. Pointing at a beauty of an oakwood trunk Michael began to speak "Okay, that is our oakwood trunk, it is our most standard, you can fit in your clothes for the year and books and some accessories, I would recommend it for those started at Hogwarts or any other kind of educational establishment. Now if you want, we can upgrade to a more mature trunk, but you probably won't yet have a need for some of our larger trunks."

"Now, if you choose the trunk, we can have it engraved with a logo, a picture and your initials of course, though that part will come at a slightly higher price. Have you got any further ideas of what you would like?"

Hermione looked at the trunks and began to calculate in her head, thinking that she knew of the kind of wood that she would like, Hermione began to think of what she wanted, she opened her mouth to ask "Could I get in a mahogany with the letters H.G in calligraphy please?"

Michael nodded and made a note on a piece of parchment that had suddenly come floating towards him.

Neville asked "Could I get in a light oak slightly stained wood? With N.L carved on top in block letters?" after observing the trunks for a while.

"Certainly, because you have come so early in the season, I can have them made up for, within about two hours?"

Frank nodded and gave Michael their names, so he knew who to make the order out to, and smiled at the group of people. With barely a tinkle of the bell above the door, the group made their way out again.

Standing in the sunshine, Frank turned back round to look back at the group, waving absent-mindedly at a family who were passing close by. Frank spoke:

"Okay, now that we've got your trunks ordered, we'll go and get your wands shall we? Allonsy!" Hermione tried to stiffle a chuckle behind her raised hand and glancing at Neville, the two of them trotted off behind Frank Longbottom. Walking up to a small shop that looked rather old and a little decrepit. The shop looked dusty and was sandwiched between two, relative skyscrapers, the other building were five stories.

The shop looked like the store front was made from some kind of dark wood originally, it had a lot of exposure to the elements not so the sign was more of a mottled colour than a brand-new sign. Sitting on one very dusty purple-cushion that looked like it had been cleaned a great many times, was a solitary stick of wood, something Hermione thought was a wand. Briefly Hermione had time to think that the people who for years had made their living by pretending to be 'magicians' and wizards, had got it vastly wrong when it came to the black sticks with the white rims.

Following through the door, Hermione laid eyes on a old fashioned small shop, that was made up of oak flooring. Seated on a small beat up leather couch was Alice, Annabelle and Gracie, sitting huddled together. Beside the small couch was a spindly chair that Frank threw himself down in. Neville walked forward shyly in the shop and rang a small brass attention bell, almost immediately a stooped wiry man came bounding out of the stacks. The bad had white hair, that looked like it had resisted all attempts to brush it.

"Ah, hello, Neville Longbottom yes? I remember outfitting your parents and grandparents for their first wands, your father was better with Defence, while you mother tended to favour a wand more for herbologists. Your Grandmother also received a wand that good for launching offensive attacks, while your grandfather god rest his soul, favoured a wand with more defensive capabilities. The perks of being a wand-creator with an almost eidetic memory my dear child!" the man began to speak with a wheezing tone of voice. "My name, is Mr Ollivander and we are here to fit you up for your wand, if you'll stand here the tape will measure you."

Hermione watched entranced as the tape seemed to flit round Neville, measure his general height, his leg length, his arm length, hand grip. With a shock Hermione noticed that the measuring tape was measuring Neville's face and nostrils. Neville let out a slight cough as the measuring tape continued to flit round his head. Mr Ollivander waved his hand and the tape dropped to the ground, as if all the life had been sucked out of it. Mr Ollivander brought forth a long cardboard box that contained some writing.

"Give it a twirl boy!" Neville hesitantly took the thin stick of wood and waved it round. Hermione saw a small flower pot on top of the counter beside the till blow up.

"No, not that one" Mr Ollivander flicked his own wand to repair the small ceramic flower pot "what about this one?" taking the small wooden wand, Neville gave it a small flick, to which before anything could happen, Mr Ollivander snatched the wand back. Disappearing amongst his stacks for a short period of time. Coming back up with one small box and muttering "I wonder if it could be this one? Stranger things have happened."

Handing Neville another wand, Neville took it and Hermione was awed as a faint yellowish light emanated for the wand that Neville was holding.

Ollivander hmmed "well, I've seen greater reactions, but I've also seen worse, okay this wand is eleven inches, made of oak, with a single strand of demiguise hair. I have a feeling though that this wand won't last you indefinitely, so I'd heartily recommend coming back in a few years for a replacement. That'll be six galleons, based on how long it will last, there's your price"

Hermione nervously stepped up to the bit of the floor that was marked with a bit tape. "Hello, Miss Granger, yes? I'm assuming that since I don't recognise that surname that you are at the least Muggle-born or at the very least, raised in the Muggle world?" Seeing Hermione nod, he went on "Welcome to the Magical World, I'm sure you'll love it! Now, my name is Mr Ollivander and I'm going to fit you for your very first wand. Don't be nervous, my measuring tape is going to take your measurements, so I can be very accurate."

With a little jump Hermione noticed that the measuring tape was now doing it's little dance round Hermione, she wondered what measures were specific to the wand and which were done because Mr Ollivander hadn't waved his hand. Eventually the tape fell to the floor and Hermione watched as Mr Ollivander peered down at a clipboard with his pale silvery eyes. He walked back towards the shelves of wands and pulled a few boxes down. Hermione tried two before Mr Ollivander pulled a wand out of a dusty box muttering "we'll see, we'll see" and handed it too Hermione.

Still unable to get over her feelings of foolishness, Hermione gave it a wave and saw a flickering yellow light emanating from the wand as soon as she touched it. The light was of the same quality as Neville's, but before Hermione could dwell for too long on this might mean, Mr Ollivander clapped his hands together and spoke "And that's you! Now that wand is 10 3/4 inches, made of vine with a dragon heartstring. Again I have a feeling that you will probably end up having to come back in a few years, so how about a round seven galleons?"

Frank pulled out the money and paid for both of the wands, which Mr Ollivander had wrapped up in a brown paper bag and handed them over. Walking out of the shop, Alice turned to the family and told them that she along with Annabelle and Gracie would walk up towards Flourish and Blotts. At this points little Gracie came and glued herself onto Hermione's side again, feeling a little chuffed that the child like her. Hermione started a small conversation with her "Did you enjoy yourself shopping Miss Gracie?"

"Yes, I did, I got a new colouring book and Annabelle got a teddy bear"

Hermione nodded listening to the child, as she chuckled, the little girl had boundless enthusiasm and energy. "That sounds like fun! Are you coming book shopping with us?"

"Yes, I am, Annabelle wants some new book in some series that she enjoys reading, and I want another picture book, Mummy said we could get them."

Running up with Gracie, Hermione listened to the little girl's laughter and couldn't help but smile a little, feeling some of the girls excitement bleeding through and making Hermione feel excited as well. Watching after her, Frank and Alice could heard to be laughing watching the two girls.

They were coming up to the shop that Hermione could feel herself getting the most excited about. Peering in through the cleaned windows, Hermione could see shelves of books, a mismatched carpet square in the corner and piles of books just piles up waiting to be opened and read. Entering into a bit of a trance, Hermione entered the shop, hearing the bell tinkling above her head. She could feel Gracie pulling on her hand, looking down startled that she hadn't entered into a walking dream.

Tapping her foot impatiently, waiting for the rest of the family to enter into the shop behind them, Hermione looked round at the books, feeling a little awed at all the books. Hermione could see some twisted stairs winding up into the upper levels, with small piles of books stacked precariously wending their way up. Hermione could see signs above each bookshelf, denoting the contents of the books. Some were potions, some were transfiguration, some were revision, some were romance, some were mystery, some were crime, Hermione thought that if heaven looked like this, she would be happy for all eternity!

When Frank, Alice, Neville & Annabelle came into the shop, Hermione was folding the list in her hands, it now had so many more creases in it that if Hermione wasn't in a book shop, she might've been a little concerned about it falling apart in her hands. Dropping Gracie's hand, Gracie immediately ran off to the children's section of books, Hermione drifted towards the section that was labelled school books. Hermione absently noticed that she could hear some footsteps following behind her, assuming it was Neville following her over to the display of books, Hermione continued on with one destination in mind.

Once Hermione had reached the row of books, she turned to Neville who smiled and handed her a basket, of which Neville had two following him. Standing in front of the row, Hermione reached in and took out two copies of 'The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1)' by Miranda Goshawk handing one to Neville, she delicately placed her copy in the little basket floating by Hermione. This routine was followed with many more books being placed in the floating baskets.

In went 'A History of Magic' by Bathilda Bagshot, a large meaty looking tome called 'Magical Theory' by Adalbert Waffling, a hard backed copy of 'A Beginner's Guide of Transfiguration' by Emeric Switch. Another medium sized book with a picture of a tree embossed on the front, called 'One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi' by a lady called Phylida Spore. A book that looked like it was covered in a plastic jacket called 'Magical Drafts and Potions' by Arsenius Jigger. 'Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them' by Newt Scamander and 'The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection' by Quentin Trimble found its way into the small cart.

Splitting up from Neville, Hermione managed to find copies of a rather large, brown tome embossed with the picture of a castle, Hermione thought it looked a bit like a generic castle, called 'Hogwarts: A History' along with a copy of a small book called 'How to successfully mix your potions: A guide to ingredients and everything you need to be successful in the art' flicking through Hermione noted that it was filled with diagrams of ingredients and tables detailing their properties. Hermione thought the thing might in fact be rather helpful to her, she had found in an aisle tucked upstairs towards the back. Hermione also found a book that explained some of the etiquette that she might find herself needing to know to leaf through.

Walking back to meet Frank, who was looking round for Hermione, he grinned when he saw her and teased her "Ah, there you are Hermione, thought that we'd never seen you again!"

Hermione smiled bashfully "Sir, you took me into a bookshop, there's a good chance that you may not have seen me for a few weeks!" Listening to Frank's big booming laugh, Hermione knew that she hadn't caused too much worry. Skipping past Frank, she paid for the books and received five paper wrapped bundles in return.

Stepping to the side and waiting for the family to finish up their transactions, Hermione started thinking about what she could learn from the wizarding world. Wondering how things were in a new world, Hermione was no dunce she knew that things like culture and what was accepted changed the world over. Shaking her head, before she could consider the matter too much, Hermione followed the family out of the shop.

Standing in the street looking up and down Hermione stood in a semi circle along with the rest of the Longbottom family while they decided what shop to go to next.

"Father, can we go to the pet store? You did say that I could look at the animals?" Annabelle asked

"That's up to your mother, if you get one that is?" Frank responded

"I think Annabelle can definitely handle the responsibility that a pet brings, maybe you'll get lucky and we will find you a familiar? Would you like a pet Hermione?"

"I'd like to look, we might see one there!"

"This way gang!" Frank gleefully called before marching up the street leading the rest of the family. Stopping in front of a shop that looked like it had cages hanging from the rafters, along with little windows looking into a shop that Hermione could only describe as looking a bit like a zoo! Going into the shop, which was made with wooden beams and stone walls, Hermione guessed that this made it easier to clean up when the animals left their own unique little presents for the shop staff! The shop was huge on the inside, there were owls, rabbits, rats, snakes, cats and dogs, the din was unimaginable. Spread out among the shop were small displays that held books on looking after animals. There were also barrels of feed and toys.

Hermione wandered towards the birds section and could see some owls, some doves, some pigeons and strangely some ravens all blinking down at her. She felt her eyes being drawn to a large Tawny owl that was roughly the size of a pigeon, it's black eyes were watching Hermione with some amusement. The eyes were surrounded by feathers that got progressively browner as they went out. Watching the owl entranced, Hermione didn't notice a girl coming up behind her, until she spoke

"That's a tawny owl, we've had a bit of trouble selling him, he's very proud you see." Hermione looked up at the owl and nodded, she could easily see this owl being very proud.

"He's gorgeous, can I have a closer look at him?" The girl nodded and walked to the counter to get out an arm guard to call the owl down. Slipping it on her arm, she brought an extra one up for Hermione to use as well. Walking back to Hermione and helping her slip the guard over her arm, she whistled out. Hermione saw the owl swivel it's head round and almost cock it to the side as if debating whether or not to go.

The owl took flight and graciously landed on the girl's arm, who introduced herself as Jenna. With the weight of the owl, Hermione could could see Jenna's arm going down slightly, but Jenna quickly recovered to lift her arm back up so Hermione could look at the owl.

"His name is Gabriel and he is a very good post owl, able to find most people, unless of course they do not want to be found. Would you like to talk to him? Or sorry, hold him?" Jenna prattled.

Hermione nodded and with a short whistle, Gabriel hopped over to Hermione's covered arm. Gabriel looked at Hermione with wise black eyes, he seemed to be really attempting to understand Hermione. When he starting making little affectionate motions towards Hermione, she found the nerves to reach up with her other hand and gently stroked Gabriel's head. When Gabriel made a little cooing noises, Jenna made a noise.

"Yes, I think he is very close to being your familiar, if he isn't, he most certainly seems to gravitate towards you, he would be a very good match for you. Would you like him?"

Looking over her shoulder to glance at Frank and Alice who were standing crowded round Gracie who was looking at something in the cat aisle. Taking matters into her hands, Hermione nodded. Jenna smiled, she had made a good commission.

"Okay, so Gabriel here is 20 Galleons, and if you come up to the front I can outfit you with the rest of the accessories! Now what kind of cage would you most like?"

"I'm not sure, what kind of cages do you have?"

"Okay, we have the ones that are more ornamental, the large ones, they aren't really good for transportation, we have got the really expensive ones, but they aren't exactly great for the owls. We have nice wicker ones, that Gabriel will probably find more comfortable and they are easily stored."

"I'll take a wicker one then, I really would prefer it if Gabriel were comfy, at least until he can get home and I can let him fly."

"Okay, well you'll want to get some treats, but Gabriel will be able to hunt for most if not all of his food, if you just let him out to hunt at night, he only has to eat several times a night."

"If you give him an address to find or a person to find, he will do his very best to find the address or person in question."

Putting the owl and the basket on the desk, she picked up a bag of mouse flavoured owl treats, along with a chewable newspaper toy and a letter toy to chew on, to keep Gabriel's gums strong. Hermione contentedly took mental notes. When she asked Jenna for the bill, she inwardly winced when Jenna told her that the final price came to thirty Galleons, forty Sickles and five Knuts.

Hermione was left back to the palace by Frank, of course that was only after Hermione promised Gracie to write her and draw a picture. While Annabelle was rolling her eyes, Hermione said goodbye. When she was left home Hermione could only collapse into bed, after the days activities she was a little tired.

* * *

**_This chapter was 12,456 words and was posted on the 31st May. Guess what i was watching when I wrote the end of this! Little sad now that DW is over until November, but sure! I had a lot of fun writing this chapter, Mum was doing a housing assessment at the same time, so I was writing constantly! The weather has perked up nicely, but it has gone slightly crappy again. I also had my final TMA (tutor marked assignment) due in this past week, we had also lost internet last week, can you imagine the stress that came with trying to hand in my assignment on time. I've also learned that it could be late July / early August before I get back the results, but I'm in Canada at that time, there's a slight chance I might get a little crazy waiting for the results!_**

**_Anyway, hope you enjoyed the chapter,_**

**_Roma_**

**_P.S. leave a review?_**


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